Taiwan red dates pass safety verification, officially launch this summer
Even after the red date season has passed, through cold winters and spring and summer, the phone calls asking about Taiwan red date dried fruit have never stopped. Finding genuine Taiwan-grown red dates bearing the correct-mark certification has become a very important matter. The Gongguan Township Farmers' Association, which is promoting origin certification labels and safety traceability verification, is working hard to let people buy genuine Taiwan red dates at a fair price. To reach such a goal, the road has been full of hardships, and everything now depends on this season's harvest.
Since Han Hong-en took office as the Farmers' Association director-general of Gongguan Township, Miaoli County three years ago, the run-down and shabby atmosphere of the association has been swept away. In the first year, Gongguan red dates still followed the old custom, with a lively red date industry and culture event held; tour buses carried in crowds of visitors one after another, date farmers set up temporary stalls at the doorways of their own corrugated-iron sheds, harvesting at dawn to welcome guests, then offering sweet red date tea brewed by farm families, with bikini-clad women in cool outfits, calling out "buy one box, get two free" in a style that drew the attention of the news media.
Of course, there are also a very small number of date farmers who move toward pesticide-free cultivation management; consumers can ask the following questions to find out
1. Is the ground under the trees cultivated with grass cover or covered with weed-suppressing mats? Is herbicide used in autumn and winter? If herbicide is used, it can never be organic.
2. Is the organic fertilizer used composted by the farm family itself? Is the commercially purchased fertilizer a material approved by the Agriculture and Food Agency as usable in organic agriculture? Although ordinary commercial mixed fertilizers contain organic matter, they are also mixed with chemical substances, so they cannot be claimed as organic fertilizer.
3. When was the last time pesticide was sprayed on the red dates? Can a pesticide test pass certificate be provided? If the test report states pesticide-free cultivation, ND should appear, meaning no pesticide detected. However, ND does not necessarily mean no pesticide was sprayed; rather, the residual amount of pesticide used has exceeded the sensitivity that the machine can detect. The degradation period of pesticides generally used on fruit trees is more than 14 days, and the pesticide residue level will roughly pass, but it takes at least several months to reach no pesticide detected. Therefore, the longer the time since spraying, the better.
4. Ask about the production year; a small number of date farmers may still have last year's dried red dates in stock that have not been cleared out. If stored properly, the quality will not deteriorate, but the color will be darker than this year's crop; only when kept under low-temperature storage can the bright red color be maintained. Sun-dried dried dates are relatively moist and soft, while machine-dried ones are relatively hard. Local dried red dates have no added artificial substances or sulfur fumigation treatment, which is the most reassuring point.
If consumers show a bit more concern and ask more questions, they can actually help farmers pay attention to our needs. When farmers are willing to follow safe pesticide use and rational fertilization methods in cultivation, the land that nurtures all things can be free of burden and will not pollute clean water quality, allowing farmland to be used sustainably.
The final key is that consumers care about what they put into their mouths and are willing to spend a little time understanding where what they buy comes from.
Many people ask, how do you buy locally produced dried red dates from Gongguan? Go to the Gongguan Township Farmers' Association, and there will certainly be no problem.