An image of corn from Johnson Fresh Farms (Johnson Fresh Farms)

By Justin Goulet

Johnson Fresh Farms powers through tough weather and impacts of COVID-19

Sep 17, 2020 | 10:34 AM

TABER, AB – Almost every business in the world has felt the effects of COVID-19, and the agriculture industry is no exception.

James Johnson with Taber’s Johnson Fresh Farms told LNN their sales haven’t been as great as in year’s past. However, he’s not sure if that all has to do with the pandemic.

“We’ve had to definitely spend a bunch of money on getting everyone their PPE [Personal Protective Equipment] and it slowed us down a bit at harvest time, just practicing some social distancing and stuff like that. Sales have been very unpredictable,” Johnson said on Wednesday morning.

“Whether that’s linked to COVID-19 or not, I know that’s definitely sent shockwaves through almost every industry as far as unpredictability of the markets and what to expect but people have to eat and we hope that they choose good quality, local food to eat.”

(Johnson Fresh Farms)

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Tough weather conditions have also issued a challenge to Johnson Fresh Farms, especially with some cooler nights recently.

“It’s always a concern when there’s frost warnings out but luckily we didn’t sustain any major damage – we got one a few nights ago [frost warning] and now, it’s just kind of a race to get all the crops in before we have one of our early October snows,” Johnson commented.

Although sales of the famous Taber corn haven’t necessarily been ideal this summer, the season had been better than last year.

In August of 2019, Johnson Fresh Farms lost about 90 percent of its crops due to a massive hailstorm that also hit Molnar’s Taber Corn.

READ MORE: Johnson Fresh Farms feels the effects of Tuesday night storm

“Last year was pretty rough, just kind of all the way around with that massive hailstorm that decimated the crops. There wasn’t tons and tons we could do as far as sales go last year,” Johnson told LNN.

In June of this year, southern Alberta was hit with another hailstorm.

“However, this year, we had to deal with another big hailstorm but luckily it was a little bit earlier in the year, so it allowed for the crops to somewhat bounce back and we were able to have somewhat of a corn harvest but I wouldn’t say it was a success – for us, it was definitely well below average but hey, it was better than last year.”

READ MORE: Taber area farmers clean up and examine damage after storm

“Our yield was way, way down especially on our stuff affected by hail, which caused some gaps in our selling season. There was about a week and a half, almost two weeks where we were cutting sales or even, we were shut down for a few days completely and then it actually caused the crops that we were supposed to be selling at that time – it pushed it back,” Johnson said.

“When we were harvesting that, instead of the other stuff that we hadn’t planned…it kind of messed up our staging and so kind of now in September when sales aren’t the greatest and demand is way down, we still have this crop that we had because it was pushed back…we probably won’t have enough sales for all of our corn crop we have left.”

As far as how much longer people can pick up their Taber corn, Johnson says they’re expecting to continue selling for another week or so.

“At that point, demand is kind of so low and we have to move on to other crops, so that’s kind of what we think is going to happen, but you never know.”

Updates on Taber corn stand openings are posted through the Johnson Taber Corn & Potatoes Facebook page.