"The outbreak will probably be helpful for farmers market business, because we don't buy from out of the country and we don't commingle our produce with other bulk stock," Avery said.
Though the California tomato season is just starting up, growers said they were seeing a sharp downturn in orders. California growers with operations in Florida, where only certain areas have been cleared by the FDA, are "being devastated," and farmers and employees at processing plants across the country are being laid off, said Tom Nassif, chief executive of the Western Growers Assn.
The association's members, based in California and Arizona, grow about half of the nation's produce.
"This outbreak will take down the whole food supply chain," Nassif said. "It could be a half-a-billion-dollar loss, much larger than the loss from the spinach outbreak" in 2006.
Growers nationwide urged health officials to speed their investigation into the origins of the salmonella, before massive quantities of tomatoes that are awaiting sale end up rotting.
"It's unfortunate that the entire country has been blanketed by this event -- there are a lot of fine tomato producers out there producing safe products that will not be purchased," said Lucky Lee, vice president of sales for New York-based Lucky's Real Tomatoes, which buys tomatoes from a cooperative of farmers and handles cleaning, packing and transportation.
Lee said the company, which employs a rigorous sanitizing process, is one of the few that have thrived since the outbreak because of its reputation for clean tomatoes. Most growers have become victims of public alarm, which has forced many restaurants and retailers to shun all tomatoes, even though many varieties are still safe to eat, Lee said.
"The outbreak is the outbreak and it happened, but the management of the information is unfortunate," Lee said. "It's been blown into a level of hysteria."
--
tiffany.hsu@latimes.com
--
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
Avoid these varieties
Three varieties of tomatoes were singled out for a warning about a salmonella outbreak by the Food and Drug Administration. According to UC Davis plant pathologist Trevor Suslow, they differ in size, shape and firmness:
Red round tomato: The standard supermarket tomato, which includes varieties like the beefsteak and comes in a range of sizes. It is typically larger and juicier than plum and Roma tomatoes and usually globe-shaped.
Plum tomato: Known as a paste tomato because of its high density, making it ideal for sauce. Usually oblong, it has a tougher skin and fewer seed pockets than a round tomato. About 2 to 3 inches long and 1.5 to 2.5 inches in diameter.
Roma tomato: A variety of the plum tomato, usually egg-shaped.
-- Tiffany Hsu
