Thread: 70 years of tomato farming on Camp Pendleton to end

AGRICULTURE: 70 years of tomato farming on Camp Pendleton to end

Harry Singh & Sons give up lease, citing rising costs, competition

By PAT MAIO - pmaio@nctimes.com
April 13, 2011 8:52 pm

Harry Singh & Sons, one of the largest suppliers of vine-ripened tomatoes in the United States and a fixture in North San Diego County for more than 70 years, announced Wednesday that it would not grow tomatoes this year, citing tough economic times and competition.

A swath of 350 acres of the grower's land leased from Camp Pendleton will be returned, ending a legacy of contract farming with the Marines. A base official said the Marines will use the land to expand "mock village" training programs needed to teach troops about what to expect in Afghanistan.

"Camp Pendleton is no longer interested in leasing the land. Close-out actions are being coordinated with Harry Singh & Sons management to that end," a base official said.

In an email distributed to employees and others, Krishna Singh, general manager and a member of the third generation of Singh farmers, wrote, "I regret to inform you that effective immediately, Harry Singh & Sons farming partnership will not be in operation for the 2011 season. We will work diligently and explore all options in our efforts to reorganize and resume farming operations for 2012."

The company notified the majority of its 87 full-time employees that they would be laid off this week.

"Saying goodbye to our employees is the saddest aspect of closing down the farming partnership," said Harry Singh Jr., president of Harry Singh & Sons, and a son of the founder.

"Many of our employees have worked for decades side by side with members of the family. Some are second- and third-generation workers who have grown up with us ---– and stuck with us during good times and bad," he said.

Some employees will stay on for some time.

"There will be a core (number of employees) there as the business closes down," said Barbara Metz, a company spokeswoman.

The decision to close reverberated in local agriculture circles.

"It's a sad commentary on where we are with farming," said Eric Larson, executive director of San Diego County Farm Bureau. "It's a tough time for farmers."

"I was shocked when I heard," said Frank Lopez, a sales representative with Carlsbad-based Aviara Parkway Farms Inc., which grows strawberries locally. "They were the No. 1 grower in San Diego County."

"It's absolutely devastating how much this will affect not only the economy of San Diego, but the buyers (for food supply chains) that depend on the product," said John Unger, a former strawberry and tomato salesman in the 1970s who turned to selling avocados for Eco-Farms Avocado Inc. in Temecula.

"They were one of the biggest growers," he said of Singh. "They sold to retail outlets everywhere from the (San Francisco) Bay to the Pacific Northwest. He (Harry Singh Sr., the founder) was a tremendous packer in quality. It'll be hard to replace."

"It's sad. It's very difficult," said Bill Wilber, president of Oceanside Pole Tomato Sales, a casualty of the closing. Oceanside Pole handles sales of the Singh tomatoes to grocery store and fast-food chains in the U.S., Canada, Japan and Mexico.

"We will close down Friday, button things up properly and get things accomplished, like calling our customers and letting them know what is happening," Wilber said.

The family-owned Harry Singh & Sons, which has grown tomatoes and other crops on 1,000 acres at Camp Pendleton, Oceanside and Bonsall for 70 years, announced in late March that it would restructure its operation in response to a "variety of economic conditions" to reflect a rising tide of imports from Mexico, along with higher fuel, labor and water costs.

Ed Beckman, president of the California Tomato Farmers, a cooperative in Fresno whose growers represent 85 percent of the state's tomato producers, characterized the announcement as "a sad one" not only for Oceanside, but also for California's agricultural community.

"We've seen, over the years, a dramatic reduction in tomato production in Orange County and now, San Diego County. Urban encroachment and competition from Mexico, along with California's regulatory environment, are all making it difficult for California farming to be economically sustainable," Beckman said.

"When 70-year-old multigeneration farming families vanish, it's a sign that all Californians should take note of," he said. "Some of California's farmers, long leaders in sustainable agriculture, are finding it difficult to achieve economic sustainability in today's economic climate."

Beckman said that he is hopeful that Harry Singh & Sons can successfully reorganize and "once again be able to farm in San Diego County."

The Singh family has farmed the land since 1940, when Harry Singh Sr. arrived after working his way across the United States from Florida, after immigrating from India at age 16.

He was allowed to build a house on Camp Pendleton, where he raised his family and grew vegetables, tomatoes being the major crop. Smaller crops have included celery, peppers and strawberries.

Harry Singh Sr., the family patriarch, died at age 81 in 1982, but not before the well-heeled business owner was invited to sit in the second row of President Ronald Reagan's first inauguration.

Harry Singh Jr., the president of the farming enterprise, and his sons, David, Krishna, Priya and Omar, own or lease land on Camp Pendleton, Oceanside and Bonsall.

"After Harry Singh & Sons allowed the former lease agreement to expire, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton elected to reserve its right to utilize the land for training requirements that promotes the combat readiness of the operating forces and meets the mission training needs of various commands," a base official said.

The base is expected to upgrade training facilities needed to help troops better confront hazardous situations, including "mock Afghanistan villages" with dummy roadside bomb labs, hidden weapons caches and machines that produce 25 smells commonly experienced in Afghan villages.

The farm, which was started by Harry Singh Sr. in 1940, grows about 4 1/2 million cartons of tomatoes annually. A carton weighs between 22 and 26 pounds.

Tomato growers in California ---- like avocado growers locally ---- have faced stiff competition from central Mexico and have struggled to cope with rising water costs.

Beckman said that tomato growers have seen a fairly significant increase in tomatoes coming into the United States; about a 30 percent increase in shipments through McClellan, Texas, the border crossing for shipping tomatoes north out of Mexico.

Beckman said Mexico invested $51 million in greenhouse construction in 2009, and that tomato production from that capital investment is beginning to pay off ---- despite a freeze that slowed the flow in December and January.

Harry Singh & Sons isn't the first tomato operation to be affected by imports and rising costs. A year ago, Gargiulo Inc., a Fresno-based tomato producer, restructured its business.

Call staff writer Pat Maio at 760-740-3527.

http://www.nctimes.com/business/article ... ba46e.html

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Oceanside’s pole tomatoes are a high-stake harvest

[Cases of vine ripened tomatoes are ready for shipment in the warehouse/packing facility at West Coast Tomato Growers. (Charlie Neuman)


Family-owned farm is largest vine-ripened tomato producer in the country.

By MARTINA SCHIMITSCHEK
AUG. 1, 2019 2:11 PM

If you’ve bought California vine-ripe tomatoes at your local grocery store, chances are they were Oceanside Poles from West Coast Tomato Growers.

The family-owned company has been growing crops in the Oceanside region for 80 years. The 680-acre business, started by Harry Singh Sr. in 1939, is the largest vine-ripened tomato producer in the country.

Leaving tomatoes on the vine as long as possible and staking them on a pole is key to the tomatoes’ flavor, said Priya Singh, the company’s general manager and one of the third generation of Singhs working in the business. The extra time on the vine in the sun allows sugars to formulate for a tastier fruit, and staking the plants, letting them to grow up to 5 feet, allows for air flow to help with the ripening process.

“Our tomatoes taste like tomatoes should taste,” he said. “Most tomatoes have no flavor nowadays.” Only about 10 percent of the commercial tomato crop is vine ripened, picked when turning red. Most tomatoes are harvested at a “mature green” stage, before the fruit turns color. To get them bright red before coming to the market, the green tomatoes are gassed with ethylene, a hormone produced naturally by ripening fruit.

[Harry Singh Jr. (at right) and his son Priya in one of the family’s tomato fields. The company sells its tomatoes under the label Oceanside Pole. (Charlie Neuman)

This method of tomato harvesting has become the norm for most grocery-store tomatoes because it makes transporting the delicate fruit easier and reduces labor costs. Mature green tomatoes are grown on the ground and are harvested all at once.

Priya said his company harvests about 22 times during the season, which starts at the beginning of July and usually runs until the end of November.

During peak harvest times in September and October, the company will pack 40,000 to 50,000 24-pound crates of tomatoes a day.

Each plant is staked to a pole, a process that requires 2,500 stakes per acre. The Singhs are the last pole-tomato producers in California. The business started on land that is now Camp Pendleton when Harry Sr. leased acreage to grow strawberries. He had emigrated from India in 1915, settling in New Mexico and farming mainly winter crops. It was on a trip west with his wife to sell his harvest that they decided to stay.

By the late ’40s, Harry Sr. had switched to growing tomatoes, a crop that was thriving in the region.

“It’s the perfect weather for growing tomatoes,” said Harry Singh Jr., who at 76 is now the patriarch of the business his father started. At one point the family leased 600 acres of land from Camp Pendleton, a contract that came to an end in 2010.

The family also has longtime leases in the rural Morro Hills region of Oceanside.

The land is near the Mission San Luis Rey, which is depicted on the Oceanside Pole boxes. The church and the Singhs have a long history. The elder Harry helped build the chapel, and many Singh children have attended school there. At the first planting, the priest blesses the fields. “We pray for a bountiful crop and the people that are here for us,” said Priya, who is one of 12 siblings. Six work in the business.

[Tomatoes are nearing their time for harvest in a field at West Coast Tomato Growers. (Charlie Neuman)

“Some are on their own path. The ones here, they love what they do,” Priya said of his large, close-knit family.

Days start early, usually with a walk through the vines. During harvest time, the tomatoes are packed on-site. The fruit is sorted by size and color with a computer-driven machine that snaps photos of each tomato along a conveyor belt. The tomatoes go from vine to market in 24 to 36 hours.

“Harry is definitely an expert grower. He’s really attached to the land and the process,” said Karin Gardener, director of corporate communications at The Oppenheimer Group, a fruit and vegetable marketing company based in Canada.

The Oppenheimer Group backed the Singhs in 2011 when the business fell on hard times and had to reorganize, including a name change from Harry Singh and Sons to West Coast Tomato Growers. It’s hard to compete with the tomatoes coming from Mexico, where they can be grown for less, Priya said. The Singhs pay their employees a living wage and hire veterans when possible to show their gratitude for being part of Camp Pendleton for so long.

“We try to give back in little ways,” Priya said.

The quality of the tomatoes is what helps keep the company in business. “They slice really clean and the beefsteaks have a beautiful round shape,” Gardener said

About two-third of the Singhs’ tomato crop is the round beefsteak variety. The rest is Romas. The quality, Priya said, comes from knowing the land.

“With three generations of growing, there’s a lot of history; a lot of lessons learned.”

Harry added a drip irrigation system in the 1970s, which has allowed them to closely monitor the moisture in the soil and keep costs down. Nearly all of the Singhs’ water supply comes from local wells.

To better make ends meet, the Singhs started planting Brussels sprouts during the winter season in 2017. This year, they are planning on planting 300 acres of the crop, which is also sold under the Oceanside Pole brand.

“It’s just the perfect fit,” said Priya, who learned the business and the respect for the land from his father.

“He allowed me the opportunity to learn and grow.

I’m grateful to him,” he said. “It’s what we love doing. I’ve never experienced a repetitive day in this business. No year has the same challenges.”

He hopes his children, two sons ages 8 and 2 and a 9-month-old daughter, will one day want to join the business.

“It’s in our blood,” he said.

A truck turns onto Singh Way from Highway 76 to go to the Singh family's West Coast Tomato Growers' packing facility, adjacent to the company's hundreds of acres of tomatoes. (Charlie Neuman)

Tomato tips

The Singh family has been growing tomatoes in Oceanside for more than 70 years. Their company, West Coast Tomato Growers, produces 36,000 tons of tomatoes annually. We asked general manager Priya Singh to give us some tips on growing tomatoes.

“It’s all about sunlight and heat,” Singh said. Here’s his advice:
• Plant tomatoes in a location with plenty of sunshine. Plants do well with eight to 10 hours of sun.

• Tomatoes can be planted anytime from early April through July. The earlier plants will take 85 to 90 days until harvest while late summer plants will take about 70 days.
• Don’t place plants too close to each other. Ideally, they should be 15 to 20 inches apart.
• Don’t over water. If the ground is too saturated, the plants will suffocate. Check the soil before watering to make sure tomatoes are not growing in mud, but do not let soil completely dry out, which will stress the fruit.
• Combat bugs with natural solutions such as dish soap or neem oil for worms. The oil also works against aphids and mildew. Garlic extract is an also effective deterrent for many bugs.
• It’s OK to refrigerate tomatoes. Ripe tomatoes can keep up to two weeks in the fridge.

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