Last year’s bumper crop of pears rotted in millions because of the dearth of workers available to pick them (it’s worth clicking on that link just for the heartbreaking picture of Toni Scully).  Increased border security, construction jobs, and other factors have kept workers away from the fields, and it’s created a real problem for farmers—as well as consumers seeking to eat food grown by actual people. 

Could we, Mas Masumoto asks, create an appellation based on social justice similar to the “fair trade” demarcations in coffee, that guarantees growers a designated price and workers goodworking conditions?  Like prepackaged vs. homemade marinara sauce, even fruits that look the same may have been produced in very different ways, ways whose ramifications have reverberating aftereffects. 

“I want the human character to be part of my fields and my produce,” he says.  “Investments in workers can benefit all parties.  Workers with faces can’t be as easily dismissed; their calls for better wages, health benefits and working conditons will no longer be whispers.” 

It’s true that a lot of our discussions about organic food center around the use (or non-use) of pesticides and other chemicals, our treatment of the animals we raise for food, the effects of our cultivation on the environment.  But we often forget to mention the aspect of farming that’s argubly most important of all: how we treat the people actually raising the stuff.

A wine’s terroir, aficionados argue, is defined by the soil in which it grows, the weather during the growing season, and the vintner’s touch, along with an innumerability of other factors.  Why wouldn’t the same be true of grapes grown for eating?  “The true character of a pristine fruit,” says Mas Masumoto, “is a result of multiple inputs: weather, soil and water as well as management and labor relations.”  We pay lots of attention to the first side of the equation—isn’t it time we talk about the other? 

Nathalie Jordi's appetites keep her bouncing between between County Cork, New York, London and the French Alps.  When not slinging curd or interviewing farmers, she writes for Travel&Leisure, Conde Nast Traveler, Gastronomica, and her blog at www.autobiogeography.com.  Her dreams of a life spent baking, drinking margaritas, and sitting in the sun are gathering steam during her current stint as a waitress in New York City.