ORLANDO, Fla. – Tomatoes are coming back to grocery shelves and restaurant menus, but state growers say their immediate prospects still look rotten.

Consumers – spooked by a recent government warning that certain kinds of tomatoes might be linked to salmonella – have shied away, despite assurances from regulators that many types are safe.

That has the state’s $500 million industry worried sick.

“The impact of this is huge,” said Rob Meade, director of sales at East Coast Brokers & Packers, one of the larger tomato growers in Florida. “The industry is going to lose hundreds of millions of dollars.”

Growers say boxes of tomatoes cleared for sale are being held up in warehouses as demand remains slack. That’s not surprising, given the recent nationwide warnings from the Food and Drug Administration about a national salmonella outbreak that began in mid-April. In addition, the FDA has declined to clear parts of Florida for tomatoes grown at the time the outbreak began.

“This is a bad situation for everybody,” said Meade, whose fields still have tomatoes to be picked.

To make matters worse, federal investigators have not pinpointed the source of the outbreak, leaving many questions in consumers’ minds about the problem that has sickened 383 people in 30 states and left at least 48 hospitalized.

‘I’m not buying them’

Sally Hamby is one shopper who is avoiding tomatoes.

“I’m not buying them,” Hamby, 60, said after a trip to Publix.

“I know they’ve listed the kinds that are safe, but I can’t tell you which ones,” she said, adding that she was going to avoid tomatoes for several weeks “to be safe.”

State officials are quick to point out that the current crop of Florida tomatoes has been cleared, and the Department of Agriculture has certified at least 4 million 25-pound boxes. They also say growers have taken extraordinary measures – such as coordinating audits and inspections with the FDA – to keep crops safe.

But convincing consumers remains a battle.

“All people were hearing was ‘tomatoes and salmonella,”‘ said Liz Compton, spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. “Public perception is certainly a concern.”


Meanwhile, the state’s growers, regulators and lawmakers are frustrated with the pace of the federal government’s investigation and the lack of clarity when it comes to the Florida crop, which is the largest in the U.S.

“We’re into the third week (of national warnings), and there is still no end in sight,” said Bob Spencer, co-owner of West Coast Tomato Inc.

Last week, the Florida congressional delegation wrote a letter to the FDA, telling the agency it needed to do more to reassure consumers about which tomatoes were safe to eat.

Tomato growers fear they could suffer the same fate as spinach producers, who have yet to see sales rebound after an E.coli outbreak in September 2006. Spinach sales are off about 10 percent compared with levels before the outbreak, according to the United Fresh Produce Association, a national produce trade group.

For tomato farmers, the question now turns to how much to invest in next year’s crop, which will be planted in the fall.

Spencer said his farm invests about $8,000 an acre to plant tomatoes.

“You are asking yourself . . . do you want to put this much money at risk?” he said.

“What if the consumer stays away?” Spencer said. “You can’t fathom the economic loss that our industry could be facing. . . . That is the scary thing when you look forward.”

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TOMATOES

Cherry and grape tomatoes and tomatoes on the vine are safe to eat.

Raw red plum, red Roma and red round tomatoes grown in certain approved states and countries are safe.

Tomatoes in production in 19 Florida counties after May 1 are safe. Those tomatoes must be certified by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The department is providing “Fresh From Florida” labels for certified tomatoes.

The FDA says the tainted tomatoes likely came from either Mexico or areas in Florida, which were supplying the bulk of U.S. tomatoes in mid-April. The Florida Department of Agriculture says it still thinks that Florida tomatoes harvested at the start of the outbreak are not the source of the salmonella.

For more information, consumers can go to the FDA’s Web site, www.fda.gov.

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(c) 2008, The Orlando Sentinel (Fla.).

Visit the Sentinel on the World Wide Web at http://www.orlandosentinel.com/.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

AP-NY-06-19-08 2113EDT