Fraser Valley farmers are scrambling to pick crops that ripened much earlier than normal as temperatures in the valley climb to near record levels this week.
Peas, beans, blueberries are all maturing weeks before their due date and growers say they just don’t have the workforce to keep up.
“I think I alone am losing a $150,000 crop—just alone myself,” said Opinder Bhatti, president of the Fraser Valley Growers Association. “There so many other farmers in the Fraser Valley. They will lose too.”
The perfect weather so far this year meant farmers saw a bumper crop on the horizon , but the temperature spike in the last few days and not enough workers to keep up mean many of Bhatti’s crops are burning on the vine.
“I need a hundred people. I have six now,” said Bhatti’s neighbour, a blueberry farmer Sharanjit Sandhu. “The problem is people. I don’t have the workers.”
And as fruit ripens early and becomes soft, quality suffers and so will the price, according to Bhatti.
Farmers get a lower price for their produce and less of it could be available to consumers in the coming weeks.
“I could lose 50% of my crop,” said Sandhu.
In the end, it could mean less local produce in stores later in the summer and higher prices as B.C. consumers will have to rely on imported fruit and vegetables from the U.S., according to Bhatti.
