Last week, Brazilian sources reported there was a scarcity of carrots in local markets. They claimed that the carrots that were being sold were both of very low quality buyers and overpriced. Some have even described the local carrots on market shelves as unusable.
Now, a number of farmers have come forward to address the claims and to defend their farming practices. One farmer, Maximillian Hernandez, who is the chairman of San Carlos Village, spoke to local reporters and insisted that they are not to blame for the high prices and low quality being seen at the local markets.
He asserted that the small growers in San Carlos did their best to provide quality carrots at a low price. According to Hernandez, it is during the phase where middlemen are involved that the price of the carrots goes up and the quality plummets.
Hernandez noted that the middlemen purchase high-quality carrots for as low as $1.30 per pound, but due to their poor storage of the carrots and substandard handling and transportation of those carrots, the quality of the carrots declines. Those same middlemen, he said, still, in a quest to maximize their profits, attach high price tags to the damaged produce. He said that these phases of the marketing chain are out of their control, and they cannot preserve the quality or price of what they grow after it has been sold.
Source: amandala.com.bz
