SEPTEMBER 2024
CELEBRATING 145 YEARS AS CANADA’S PREMIER HORTICULTURAL PUBLICATION
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LIFE EXTENSIONS
Broccoli, straight up. No ice!
For decades, iced broccoli has been the status quo to keep it fresh from field to fork. Today, early adopter Jocelyn Gibouleau (L), Les Productions Margiric, is testing the innovation of Verdant Technologies. It’s a transparent sheet packed at the bottom of each box to slow down the respiration rate as soon as broccoli is harvested in the field. Here, Matt Aronson, (middle), Verdant Technologies and Tom Pierce, Sobeys, visit the field in Laval, Québec. They are tracking the broccoli from the field to the Sobeys distribution centre in Boucherville to a Sobeys IGA store in Montréal to see how the broccoli stacks up in shelf life. Photos by Michael Abril. KAREN DAVIDSON Broccoli may look muscular but it’s deceivingly fragile. Once sliced from its thick stalk and sheltering leaves, its days are numbered. The florets are prone to yellowing after just five days and the trunk has a propensity to turn limp. Traditionally, harvested broccoli has been packed with a cap of ice to provide shelf life of up to 10 days. But that practice of shipping ice over miles – and days – is becoming increasingly unsustainable. Verdant Technologies, an American agtech company headquartered in Centennial, Colorado, estimates that status-quo methods for transporting broccoli can demand up to 3,500 gallons of ice per trailer load to keep it forestgreen fresh. That amounts to 13,230 litres of water, an increasingly precious resource in North America. Factor in the energy required to freeze that water, weighting half the cargo load with ice rather than
produce, as well as safety issues from ice melt while in transit from field to distribution centre to the grocery store, and the conclusion becomes clear. Delivering fresh, iced broccoli is a pain point for growers. In the lab Researchers at Verdant Technologies are proving they can do better based on a novel use of 1-methylcyclopropene (1-MCP), an off-patent, synthetic plant growth regulator that’s been used for decades in long-term apple storage. 1-MCP slows down ripening of fresh produce by blocking the binding of ethylene, a naturally-occurring growth hormone. “Our proprietary, HarvestHold Fresh technology works,” confirms Matt Aronson, chief revenue officer, Verdant Technologies, adding that the innovative science was in developing a process to incorporate 1-MCP into an easy-to-apply sheet which then gradually releases the right amount of active ingredient during shipping. HarvestHold
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Fresh sheets, currently designed as an in-field application, can be positioned quickly in the bottom of the packing carton. Following extensive U.S. trials with Sobeys proving that the technology works - from field to fork – Verdant Technologies obtained registration for HarvestHold Fresh with Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency in April 2024. In just three short months, it has been put to practical use in Canada. In the field “Our family has been growing broccoli for 50 years,” says Jocelyn Gibouleau, Les Productions Margiric, Laval, Québec. In total, the family grows a thousand acres, supplying clients as far away as Surrey, British Columbia. “Broccoli is different from any other commodity,” he explains. “Broccoli is very sensitive.” Continued on page 3
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