U.S. tomato scare benefits Canada growers

TORONTO, June 11 (UPI) -- Canadian tomato growers report charging 10 percent higher prices this week to U.S. buyers concerned over an ongoing salmonella outbreak.

"I've never experienced anything like this," Nick Mastronardi, a tomato farmer near Leamington, in southwestern Ontario, told the Globe and Mail newspaper. He said U.S. demand has driven prices up 10 percent since Monday.

Since April, 167 people in the United States have been sickened by eating uncooked tomatoes and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration continues to try isolating the source, the report said.

Maureen Sheehan, the marketing director for British Columbia's B.C. Hot House Foods Inc., told the newspaper producers in the province are being deluged with calls from U.S. buyers.

Not all Canadians are benefiting from the outbreak. Nick Badame, a buyer for an Ontario produce company, said last week he was selling about 1,500 boxes of U.S. grown tomatoes each day but Tuesday he only sold 40, the report said.