American Sweet Bean Company

Oh, beans

PHOTO BY VICKI JOHNSON
Charles Fry poses with an edamame plant during last August’s harvest.

 

Seneca County is poised to become the nation's focal point in an emerging food-grade soybean crop called edamame - or sweet beans.

"We have the opportunity to become the edamame-growing region in the United States," said Charles Fry, who founded the American Sweet Bean Co. with his father, Jerry Fry. "It's there. We're just going to have to get on it."

Fry said edamame is to soybeans as sweet corn is to field corn.

The company is inviting growers to a meeting 8 a.m. Tuesday at Nature Trails Golf Course to learn about contracting acres to the crop during the coming growing season. He said a total of 1,000 acres is needed.

"Anybody that's interested, I want to know about it," Fry said.

"The business opportunity here is that roughly 90 percent of what is consumed in this country is imported," he said. Only a few farmers in the United States are growing the crop and the rest is imported from China.

"Chinese food doesn't have the greatest reputation right now," he said. "Importers recognize this problem."

Because U.S. food companies are looking for a domestic product, he said the market is in place.

"We're going to plant every seed we can get," he said. "The crop is already spoken for. We have buyers waiting.

"They are extremely fascinated and interested in making this successful," he said. "And there are even bigger buyers that are saying, 'If you do this right this year, we want to be first in line next year.'"

He is looking ahead to expanding acreage to 3,000-5,000 in the 2010 growing season.

"We have the demand for it," he said. "We're to the point now where a lot of guys ought to be able to make a lot of money at it."

Although the vegetable isn't well known locally, Fry said edamame is rapidly becoming popular in urban grocery stores.

"Sales are increasing at double-digit percentages rapidly year after year," he said.

"From a farmer's perspective, right now it pays like a vegetable crop, but it grows like a grain crop," he said.

While high-value vegetable crops such as tomatoes, pickles and cabbage generally return a higher profit per acre than do corn and soybeans, input costs also are higher.

"(For edamame) profit is much closer to a vegetable crop, but labor needs are much closer to corn and beans," he said.

The crop requires no migrant labor.

"It grows like soybeans," he said.

Growers who decide to contract with the company would buy seed from the company and plant the crop at a specified time between early May and early July.

Farmers are responsible for weed control, but can turn to the company for advice on herbicide programs.

"They're non-GMO beans, so we can't use Roundup," Fry said.

The crop is harvested by the company at its "peak of green-ness," he said.

The company plans to harvest in a staggered rotation for 10 weeks around August and September using three harvesters. Because of the need to move equipment quickly, he said 50 acres is the minimum that can be contracted.

"It's not as sensitive to soil conditions as some other crops, but we like it on sandier soil," he said. " We get better yields. These sandy loams we have around here, frankly they're perfect."

Although potential profits are to be discussed at the meeting, Fry said growers can expect to make a gross profit of $750 an acre after input costs.

"That compares to a couple hundred dollars for corn," he said.

Next summer, Fry said the American Sweet Bean Co. plans to commercialize processing although the details haven't yet been finalized.

"We have all the pieces in place to expand really rapidly," he said. "In 2009, we want to put the region on the map in the food industry as a regional source of edamame."

If local farmers aren't interested, Fry said he plans to move on to other counties.

"During the past few years, we've been proving we can grow it and process it," he said. "Now we need more growers."

The initial tests were conducted on Fry Farms between Old Fort and Bettsville and Riehm Farms near Old Fort.

Fry foresees the crop to be an important addition for county growers and he predicts the "really big" vegetable businesses will increase the demand within the next five years.

"We want to develop quality and reputation ahead of time, so they have no reason to look anywhere else," he said. "We're all the pieces together, joining growers with the market."