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U.S. NEWS Monday 20 March 2017
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Saffron growers look to get a foothold in the US

who have been raising it Ara Lynn, of Amazing Flow- the workshop.
outside in Massachusetts, er Farm in New Ipswich, But she worries about
Pennsylvania and Maine. New Hampshire, has al- marketing.“If we can’t find
The Mennonite church had ready planted some saf- a way to market it and get
been looking for a way to fron to supplement her that kind of money that
preserve its small farms, business of raising annuals they’re talking about then
said Peter Johnson, of the and perennials. it’s just another endeavor
Amish-Mennonite Center of “It gives a potential income that doesn’t work,” she
Sustainable Agriculture, in stream at a time when said.UVM researchers be-
Wenham, Massachusetts. we’re doing nothing, or if lieve the more growers, the
“We are convinced that we are, we’re just paying better. “How can you start
this is the crop that will workers and all the mon- encouraging a market for
keep our young kids on the ey’s going out and noth- saffron if you only have a
farms,” he said at the work- ing’s coming in, so it makes few growers growing it?”
shop. a lot of sense,” she said at said Margaret Skinner.q

University of Vermont graduate student Agrin Davari displays
saffron plants during a university workshop, in Burlington, Vt. The
university researchers have been raising the exotic spice now
grown primarily in Iran and are encouraging growers to tap into
what they hope will be a cash crop.
(AP Photo/Lisa Rathke)

LISA RATHKE The family had been
The Associated Press searching for a crop to
BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) — grow in their high tunnel, a
As spring crocus blooms greenhouse-like structure
approach, some growers without heat like one UVM
have visions of a fall-flow- also used to raise the spice.
ering crocus that produces “We were like looking into
saffron, the world’s most everything and then all of a
valuable spice. sudden this came up, and
University of Vermont re- we were like, ‘This can’t
searchers have been rais- be real,’” said Fontaine’s
ing the exotic spice now brother Ryan Golembeske.
grown primarily in Iran and UVM researchers said the
are encouraging growers yields amounted to $4.03
to tap into what they hope a square foot, compared
will be a cash crop. to $3.51 a square foot for
It’s not a hard sell, particu- tomatoes, and $1.81 a
larly in the short growing square foot for winter leafy
season of the Northeast. A greens.
crop harvested in the late They estimate an acre of
fall, when other crops have saffron grown in high tun-
died off, that tolerates ex- nels could bring in $100,000
treme climates and yields a season.
an average of $19 per The seasoning comes from
gram. the dried red threads, or
“Is this the red gold we’ve stigmas, of the plant’s pur-
been looking for?” said Pa- ple flower, enhancing dish-
tricia Fontaine, of Palmer es like paella, bouillabaisse
Farm in Little Compton, and risotto. It’s also prized
Rhode Island. She, her as a natural dye, for me-
mother and brother attend- dicinal purposes and was
ed a sold-out workshop this used by Cleopatra in warm
month on growing saffron baths.
hosted by the University of UVM is not the first in the U.S.
Vermont that drew grow- to raise saffron. There are
ers from New England and other small growers around
as far away as Indiana and the country, including Men-
California. nonite and Amish farmers,