Interview Two as promissed:

The typical crops grown here in Almeria include the following: Tomato, sweet pepper, cucumber, watermelon, melon, green bean, and eggplant. In addition, there are various other veggies (zucchini) and fruits (apples, oranges) grown but typically this is what you are going to find in a greenhouse. Most of these products are sold within the European Union and particularly to the ricer Northern European countries like Germany, Holland, England, etc. The majorities of the products are not organic and are grown with lots of pesticides. However, in the last year the number of products grown biologically has grown considerably. Biological means that instead of using pesticides, the greenhouse uses, for example spiders to eat the white fly or some other kind of carnivore bug that feeds on any bug that eats the products. Here they call this integrated agriculture because it is not organic and not normal but in-between.

In the last twenty years the greenhouses has changed a lot. This is because the agriculture business here is very competitive and a farmer must change with the times. This Means that when a more productive form of a greenhouse is discovered it is in the farmer’s best interest to change as well. Some of these changes include a more integrated ventilation system that allows for better and faster climate control; the structures are now higher than before (off the ground), and learning ways to control the microclimate in an inexpensive matter. Increasing the amount of windows to allow for better ventilation and sunlight is an example of an inexpensive change. The changes have not been huge ones but have been constant in the long term to make a big change.

There has been a problem with water shortages in the past but the building of three desalination plants (one more in the process of being completed) have solved the problem of water shortages for the most part. The interviewee said that the majority of the water from these plants was for agricultural purposes. In the last ten years the competition between tourism development and agriculture has begun to increase. So in the area of the Campo de Dalias, greenhouse production has actually decreased some from the growth in tourism. But a new area of greenhouse production is growing to the east of Almeria to make up for the decrease in the Dalias.
One of the bigger problems for the area is competition from other countries that are beginning to develop their greenhouse agriculture. Morocco is now the largest producer of green beans for the European Union, where before it was Almeria. Because of this, the farmer must change to a different product because he is unable to sell the green beans for a competitive enough price.

For now the majority of the greenhouses in Almeria are owned by small scale local families that pass the job from generation to generation but small enterprises are emerging as stiff competition for these families. For the interviewee he believes that the greenhouses will slowly be taken over by the enterprises and that already this is happening in a small scale. Most of the vegetables are sold to a cooperative that then sells them to the grocery store or the product is taken to an auction. At the auction, the various products are betted on by some form of buyer who then would sell them to the grocery store. This auction is much simpler than and not as hectic as a normal auction.

Well this was probably pretty boring for the majority of you but hope you liked it. There is a bit more on water policies that left out.