Turning Spain's desert into Europe's orchard

to Spain now where Seth Doane takes  us to an unusual Oasis in the desert pretty much always tomato season  here Biosabor Farms ships to 24   countries and resembles an internet retailer  at Christmas but it's this busy all year round   Francisco Belmonte runs this organic farm in  southern Spain in one of the driest parts of   Europe we met amid Acres of lush cucumber plants  in one of his sprawling high-tech greenhouses this   is far from farming in your backyard in Almeria in  Almeria this Garden in the middle of the desert he   said it's the only way to produce Almeria appears  shrink wrapped a plastic canopy stretches over   more than 80 Thousand Acres it's criticized as a  sea of plastic he says but under it is an Amazon   jungle and this plastic allows us to feed all of  Europe during the winter it's a miracle in the   movies Almeria's dry landscape was a stand-in for  the dusty American frontier in dozens of westerns   but when they were shooting the desert  train attack scene here for Lawrence of   Arabia in the 1960s another sort  of production started building   greenhouses key to today's economy this sea  of plastic is now visible from outer space   yes it's impressive some would say it's a blight  on the landscape you say it's impressive it's   impressive because they permit our our production  Jose Antonio Aliaga the Region's Secretary   General of Agriculture acknowledges issues in this  production it cracked Down On hiring undocumented   workers but migrants at one Camp told us it's  still possible to find a job without proper papers   and there are other costs 98 of this plastic is  recycled it has to be replaced every four to five   years these are huge greenhouses yes but it's a a  little presentation of the of our land it's only   the 3.5 percent of the province of Almeria whereas  agriculture is 50 of the Region's economy what   would this place be without without greenhouses  nothing I think so at Gava group Vince Martin's   conrado says challenges have sparked Innovation  they train Peppers to climb nearly 10 feet high   to use less land drip irrigation maximizes water  use where does this water come from from the ocean   salt water is desalinated they mix in  fertilizer but eliminated pesticides   this attracts the insects you want that's right  that's right the good insights to that tweets   the bad insects agrobio is a company working with  Growers to introduce plants that attract natural   predators of pests when that's not enough Enric  Villa explained they breed them these guys will   eat pests on Peppers these tiny bugs have  been part of a major transformation farms   in Almeria had been using so many pesticides  they were losing Effectiveness so since 2006   more than 70 percent of Growers here there's a  transition to using natural Predators as Pest   Control in a way it's what just what we are doing  is recovering the Natural Balance that was before   our agriculture was established they're raising  other insects as pollinators but the growth   is is getting is a colony like this with one  Queen and around 80 workers these colonies are   shipped worldwide in Almeria they primarily  pollinate Tomatoes which fill more than 16   000 football fields of greenhouses this  patch of desert has become Europe's Orchard

Channel: CBS Sunday Morning

Views: 101,748

Keywords: CBS Sunday Morning, CBS News, news, Spain, desert, greenhouses

Id: v0jI8cYqqfc

Length: 4min 18sec (258 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 30 2023