Re: [CH] Seminis, Dave A.

Dave Anderson (Chilehead@tough-love.com)
Sat, 22 Jul 2000 12:20:25 -0700 

Unfortunately, I don't know where this information came from and 
since the article isn't complete it might be taken out of context.

I receive a monthly newsletter from Seminis and this has not been 
mentioned. 

Their catalog contains the following

Hot Pepper

Hybrid-15 varieties
Open Pollinated-17 varieties

Sweet Pepper

Hybrid-22 varieties
Open Pollinated-19 varieties

Tomato

Hybrid-50 varieties
Open Pollinated-40 varieties

For 2001 they are introducing 2 sweet, 2 hot and Fooled You, the 
heatless Jalapeno. Not sure how that gets gets classified:-). The 
are introducing 3 tomato varieties. All of these are hybrid seeds.

These varieties are for home and small market growers. They also 
produce tomato seeds for commercial growers, but I don't know 
how many varieties there are.

If they do eliminate any peppers or tomatoes, I imagine they will be 
hybrids as these are much more expensive to produce. While they 
may quit producing this many varieties, the germplasm won't go 
away. They claim to have one of the largest collections in the 
world. If I hear anything,\ from Seminis I'll let you know.

Dave Anderson
TLCC
http://www.tough-love.com
> Snip
> 
> Earmarked for Extinction?
> Seminis Eliminates 2,000 Varieties
> 
> Summary:     the world's largest vegetable seed corporation,
> announced on 28 June that it would eliminate 2,000
> varieties - or 25% of its total product line - as a
> cost-cutting
> measure. Seed industry consolidation is dramatically narrowing
> the availability of non-hybrid vegetable varieties and a wealth of
> seed diversity is being lost forever.
> 
> Snip
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> To Dave Anderson
> 
> Since you are the closest to the wholesale mkt of anyone on this list, Is
> there any way you could translate this list
> for chile and tomato growers, It looks like their greed is going to hurt
> some of us.
> 
> Maybe before growing season is over we should be thinking about seed saving
> and swapping even more.
> 
> Thank you
> Byron
> 
> 
> 
>