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Carlos: We live in the age of informa- tion, yet this is the age where misinforma- tion is most rampant throughout our civili- zation. One group says something, another group says something else, yet there’s all this data out there and weeding through data is crucial. We need to base our decisions on actual data and science and peer-reviewed info respected in scienti c journals. What are the risks and theories, like the whole non-GMO craze we went through and still riding through?
PB: It’s interesting because you have a legal background and a wealth of expe- rience delving into the facts, so this must be very useful in assessments related to sustainability initiatives...
Carlos: My profession requires me to look into facts and not just opinions and hearsay, but info vetted by experts in their areas and peer reviewed by experts and published by respected journals around these topics.
Based on that, our approach to produce sustainability measures follows. For instance, we understand the GMO and non-GMO movement; there is no scienti c data that
shows GMOs are harmful to ones’ health, but there’s an asterisk —while the product might not be harmful, that organism could be harmful to its own environment. Genetically modi ed to that pesticide, an apple or tomato will continue to grow, but everything around it could be toxic.
So, our focus has been we don’t believe one size ts all. Conventional produce is still out there being done in a responsible way, and we want to work with conven- tional growers, but we are also advocates of organic growers. We believe organic produc- tion is healthier to the environment.
PB: How does locally grown product t within your strategy?
Carlos: As we expected, new markets involve developing local growers from that region. But it’s dif cult if we’re opening a store in Philadelphia, for example, where there is not a lot of local produce grown in that area. We work with other local suppliers.
In areas where we can — like in Cali- fornia, Texas, Colorado, and Arizona — our produce merchandising team is best in class, I know I sound biased, but everybody is in
awe how they handle merchandising for produce. They go out there and establish relationships with growers. We work with hundreds of local growers and suppliers to ensure we capture the best produce, the best pricing and incredible sourcing.
Q: What are the biggest challenges and opportunities going forward?
A: Climate change is a major issue and there shouldn’t be controversy around that. We do an incredible amount of work to offset the problem with our Food Rescue Program, diverting millions of pounds of food waste from land lls. The fact we’re diverting food waste and feeding people or animals or composting makes a difference. This amounts to 75,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalent, or 16,000 cars running a full year on the road. How do we continue that? We’ve done carbon inventory assessment throughout the supply chain. Transportation is the obvious one, and we work with EPA gold standard transportation companies. There are many other initiatives underway as we continue our internal plight to address the overarching issue of climate change. pb
PRODUCE BUSINESS / MAY 2018 / SPROUTS-15