For every tyre of imported vegetables that enters the market, we lose one acre of greenhouses – Agro Plovdiv – 2024-11-06 08:47:00

Only chess gardeners can survive the climate crisis

Only gardeners who can see several steps ahead can survive in the changes of climatecomplying with them, says Council of Councils – a well-known gardener and manager of a Plant for the production of seedlings in Plovdiv. The increasingly long summer gives growers a chance to grow in the field crops of more climate-resistant vegetables that are not mainstream but have a market. “The gardener must be chess playerto stay in business. He who drives the old will go down,” he sums up.

The hot weather is the reason for the degeneration of the hybrid seeds of vegetables, observes Radi Radev. “Plants don’t grow the tomatoes whose attractive features are written on the big label. Instead of feeding large fruits, they produce tiny tomatoes because they “take to the wild” to survive. Under unfavorable climatic conditions, the maximum program of plants is limited to reproducing their species by producing seeds, regardless of whether the fruits are marketable or not.

For Radi Radev, providing a suitable microclimate for vegetables is extremely important.

“These lettuces here (he points to the plants he grows outdoors) were frozen a few days ago. When I covered them with acrylic and gave them the warmth they needed, they came alive.”

“Here’s the Chinese cabbage I saved by covering it with acrylic. It is developing beautifully,” Radi Radev raises another sail.

The gardener also demonstrates a new variety of green onion, on which he cuts the feathers, and new stalks sprout from the bulb. He is convinced that soon we will see in the commercial network exactly such links with onions, in which the white part near the roots (the head) is absent. Because after all, the green part of the onion is useful.

“We already have an excess of sun, and a deficit of carbon dioxide,” Radev surprisingly adds. Last week, going to a classroom at the Agrarian University in Plovdiv to give a lecture to the students, he stopped to look at the data of the local weather station in front of the Rectorate.

“I saw the station reading 286 ppm of carbon dioxide with a specified minimum of 300 and a maximum of 600 ppm. This is an absolute mystery to me, since the world is making efforts to reduce the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the air, isn’t it?’

If the readings from the device in front of the Rectory are correct, this is bad news for plants that breathe in carbon dioxide to produce oxygen. “To get it, they will open their stomata as much as possible, increase transpiration, which is the most expensive thing for us gardeners. We water the plants precisely to limit it and reduce the possibility of creating a calcium deficiency, because otherwise the plants will dry out,” explains the gardener. And he adds that for photosynthesis to occur, there must be enough carbon dioxide in the air.

The vegetable market especially worries Radi Radev. “I see fewer and fewer gardeners every year. And the reason is the huge import from other countries. I don’t mind Turkish, Macedonian or Polish tomatoes coming in in December and January. On the contrary – let them be, because vegetables are a very important part of our table. But when in August I see a line of trucks loaded with imported vegetables waiting outside the markets to unload, it makes me sick. One tire carries 15 tons of tomatoes. So is the production of this vegetable per acre of greenhouse. With each shoot we lose an acre of greenhouse. Because the imports are coming in at killer low prices, and our producer is participating in an unfair competition in which he has not been given the conditions to survive. That is why Bulgarian gardeners are disappearing [и не виждат дори знак за подкрепа от държавата].“