The allure of procuring locally continues to climb at Hunts Point Terminal Market.
James Margiotta, managing member for J Margiotta Company LLC, says local produce is especially hot during the summer season when there’s a substantial increase in available regional options.
Joel Fierman, president of Joseph Fierman & Son Inc., agrees that locally grown is a significant player, but stresses it is not a recent trend.
“It’s not a new invention in the Northeast,” he says.
In the Northeast corridor, the spring-summer window when local fruits and vegetables dominate is certainly welcome. It is not, however, a new phenomenon. “It’s always been a good thing.”
Margiotta says the importance of environmental concerns in swaying consumers to seek local produce, like reducing carbon footprints, but he believes demand is fueled more by a certainty that what they’re eating is fresh.
“If you get a grape or an apple, it might be from Chile or Washington, but with locally grown, consumers are confident in knowing it came from their neck of the woods,” he says.
Fres Co LLC has an entirely different view of local. The importer and distributor actively pursues local products, but redefines “local” to mean what is natively grown and most easily sourced.
“Local should not be defined by proximity to our facility or domestically grown,” emphasizes Charlie J. DiMaggio, president of the company.
“For example,” DiMaggio says, “pineapples grown in Costa Rica are obtained easier, quicker—and more importantly—fresher when bought from our Costa Rican partners, than from our neighbors in Mexico.”
He believes each commodity should be considered individually to “stand on its own merits and go through analytics and standard checks.”
DiMaggio contends that all aspects of production should be weighed when making supply decisions.
“Is it better to buy from a local farmer with old machinery that leaves a bigger carbon footprint than to buy farther away from a more modern grower, whose overall footprint has less impact on our environment?”
Although he confirms the company does source liberally from “local producers in the tristate area, as a responsible business owner, I believe it is imperative we come to our own conclusions. At Fres Co,” DiMaggio says, “we believe that a thorough analysis can result in both a profitable and environmentally sound choice.”
This is an excerpt from the most recent Produce Blueprints quarterly journal. Click here to read the full article.
