About 150 people lined up for the 7 a.m. opening to shop or see what the nation’s largest natural and organic foods retailer has to offer.

“Wow!” said Shayne Stambler, a photographer from Diamond Head who almost exclusively buys groceries at natural food stores but had never before been to a Whole Foods. “The presentation is fabulous. The seafood and meat: unbelievable.”

The new store is one of four the upscale retailer based in Texas plans to open in Hawai’i over the next two years, an entry that is bringing new competition to the more than 40 small, independent natural and organic food retailers in the state.

Whole Foods, however, with its big stores located largely in major malls or retail complexes, also is expected to raise consumer awareness about natural and organic foods, something that also will benefit smaller retailers in the industry.

Colleen Conlan, a freelance graphic artist who lives in Mo’i-li’ili, is a regular customer of Down To Earth Natural Foods and Lifestyle as well as Kokua Market near her home. She said she will likely do more shopping at Whole Foods because the store has a broader selection of items such as gluten-free baked goods and nitrate-free meats.

“I have to eat gluten-free stuff,” she said as she placed items, including gluten-free carrot cake and scones, on the checkout conveyer. “You can’t find that at all anywhere (on O’ahu). I have to make my own.”

Scot Kawakami, a 38-year-old mechanic from Waipi’o, stopped by to see what was in the Whole Foods store yesterday after helping fiancee Julie Lee, 35, drop off her two children at school nearby.

Kawakami and Lee, who don’t normally shop at natural food stores, were impressed that they could buy fresh fish and have it cooked for free in the store — pan-fried, baked, steamed or grilled with a variety of seasonings.

“It’s convenient, especially if you’re running late or if you’re lazy,” Kawakami said.

Lee, a postal carrier, said she was also surprised that prices of many items in the store aren’t exorbitant. “We didn’t think we could afford to buy anything,” she said. “But it’s not that bad.”

Lee and Kawakami picked up about a pound of smoked pulled pork seasoned with garlic pepper for dinner, and later filled their basket with more items.

Ine Miller, a student from Hawai’i Kai, said she primarily shops at traditional grocery stores with an occasional stop at a health food store, but will probably visit Whole Foods once a week.

“Just to be able to get everything at one time is helpful,” she said.

Carter Allen, owner of Celestial Natural Foods in Hale’iwa, said he hopes Whole Foods will help accelerate the natural and organic foods movement that has been slow to build among consumers since the early 1970s, when he opened his store.

“They hopefully are going to turn more people on to natural foods and organic foods,” he said. “The proof will be in the pudding in a year or two.”

For other local natural food retailers closer to the Kahala Whole Foods store, especially ‘Umeke Market Natural Foods & Deli across the street from Kahala Mall, there will be more head-to-head competition with the giant.

But Whole Foods also will compete to an extent with traditional supermarkets selling fish, meats, produce, beer, wine and extensive offerings of hot and cold prepared foods.

Whole Foods said its Kahala store features the largest seafood preparation kitchen in the 270-store chain. The store is also the only one in the chain that sells poke. The variety was typical of local grocery stores, and included spicy ahi, ahi with limu and tako poke. The price: $13.99 a pound. More unusual items included smoked bay scallops with Asian spice at $17.99 a pound.

Prepared hot and cold foods ready for eating are a major element in the store. There is a breakfast bar stocked with pans of scrambled eggs, scrambled egg whites, spinach tofu, sausages, fried chicken, rice and oatmeal.

Pizzas are baked and sold whole or by the slice. Sushi is also prepared fresh daily.

An area next to the bakery with seating sells brewed coffee, smoothies, gelato and chocolates.

A couple of bars feature salads and salad ingredients, from raw vegetables and fruits to prepared waldorf salads with tuna or salmon.

A plate lunch station yesterday was selling three plates — curry rice, shoyu chicken and kalua pig — available with two side selections of steamed rice, curry rice, macaroni salad, potato salad or steamed vegetables for $8.99 to $10.99.

Other hot prepared foods are made to order at a stir-fry station, including bowls of beef broccoli, mushroom chicken and hot soba noodles.

There even was something in the deli case created by Whole Foods as a healthier alternative to Spam — thick slices of “Hawaiian Style Ham” made from pork butt, ham, cornstarch, beet juice, sugar, water and salt, for $11.99 a pound.

“It’s a little hammy,” said Andie Lee, a Honolulu housewife. “It’s not like Spam, but it’s very delicious, like turkey meat loaf.”

“It tastes like chicken,” countered Lee’s husband, Rob, a Hawaiian Airlines pilot. “Pretty good.”

The Kahala Whole Foods also has a body-care products section that’s the size of a small specialty store. The whole store, which covers 28,000 square feet previously occupied mostly by Star Market, will be the second smallest for the chain in Hawai’i.

A 26,366-square-foot store is slated to open in Kahului, Maui, next year.

The biggest store is planned for Kailua, at 40,000 square feet. That’s projected to open in 2010.

A store at Ward Centers initially was slated to open this year, and be 67,000 square feet on two levels, but recently was scaled back and delayed. It will be 35,000 square feet on one level and open in the first quarter of 2010.

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This new loan program, which falls under Act 209, supports renewable energy technologies such as photovoltaic, hydroelectric, wind, methane, biodiesel and ethanol. It also makes loans available for food-safety projects.

The loans, which are capped at $1.5 million, or 85 percent of the project, may be used for infrastructure, equipment, land improvement and operating costs. They will carry 3 to 5 percent interest rates.

Loan requests will be taken through DEC. 31. Applicants must be full-time farmers, ranchers, growers or aqua culturists. They must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents and they must have resided in Hawaii for the past three years.

For more information, contact an HDOA Agricultural Loan Office in your region or visit the Web site: http://hawaii.gov/hdoa/agl/agricultural-loan-division. On Oahu, phone 973-9460. Neighbor island phone numbers are: Hilo, 974-4140; Kona, 323-7591; Kauai, 274-3141, ext. 39460; Maui, 984-2400, ext. 39460; and Molokai, 1-800-468-4644, ext. 39460.

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ML&P’s pineapple production will drop by half, from about 2,000 acres to around 1,000 acres. Of the 274 jobs being cut, 204 are in the company’s pineapple division of 441 employees.

And if the drastic reduction doesn’t turn around the money-losing operation, then what’s left of pineapple production in Hawai’i could disappear.

"If we can’t make it work, we’ll have to leave the business," said Wes Nohara, general manager of agricultural operations for the Kahului-based company. "It’s a daunting task and a huge undertaking to salvage what we have. I’m not throwing in the towel. We’ve been here a long time and we’re going to do everything we can to make it work."

Some of the financial pressure to cut jobs is because ML&P is rooted in two other Hawai’i industries under stress — real estate development and tourism.

The company is the developer of Kapalua Resort, and has heavily invested in redeveloping parts of the resort. But the pineapple business in Hawai’i for years has been shrinking and claiming jobs.

Two years ago, Del Monte Fresh Produce quit farming pineapple on O’ahu, laid off 551 employees and ended operations in Hawai’i that had existed for more than a century.

ML&P hasn’t avoided such pressure. A decade ago the company employed 1,480 people in pineapple production and farmed about 6,000 acres.

High land and labor costs have made Hawai’i pineapple growers less competitive with producers in Costa Rica, Mexico, Ecuador and other countries.

ML&P thought it had a plan to ensure the viability of its pineapple business when it quit canning the fruit — a move that eliminated 120 jobs last year in favor of concentrating on the higher premium fresh pineapple market with its Maui Gold brand.

As part of the plan, the company began shifting growing operations from Hali’imaile in UpCountry Maui to Honolua in West Maui. The move, which is still in progress, was envisioned to take advantage of better growing conditions, shorter growing cycles and lower operating costs in Honolua and free up land in Hali’imaile for development.

But skyrocketing oil prices made it more costly to transport pineapples from Honolua to a processing facility in Kahului. Higher fertilizer demand in Honolua also became more costly.

Doug MacCluer, a former Maui Pineapple vice president and agronomist who retired in 2002 after 39 years with the company, called the move a big mistake.

"This didn’t have to happen," he said of the layoffs. "They chose to sell off the best farm land they had."

Nohara said the relocation plan turned out to be unfortunate but that soaring oil prices couldn’t have been anticipated. "In hindsight I’d say we made some bad decisions," he said.

diversifying crops

The strategy now with downsized pineapple is to primarily serve local markets and a "handful" of Mainland accounts.

Nohara also said more efforts are being made to further diversify crops beyond 200 acres of organic farming that include pineapples, vegetables and free-range chickens. There are also plans to plant 500 to 600 acres in koa as a forestry crop that could be harvested in about 30 years.

Another potential large-scale crop is plants for ethanol production, which ML&P is exploring through a partnership with other large landowners, including Kamehameha Schools and Grove Farm.

Reducing pineapple production is forecast to save ML&P $11 million in annual operating costs minus a one-time cost of $3 million for employee severance costs.

Operating losses in agriculture last year totaled $26.6 million for the company, up from a loss of $18.6 million a year earlier.

Real estate development and resort operations helped the company achieve a net profit of $8 million last year and $7.2 million in 2006.

During the first quarter of this year, ML&P reported a net loss of $740,000, largely driven by an agriculture operating loss of $5.6 million. Resort operations posted a $2.3 million operating loss, while real estate development had an operating profit of $8.2 million, which was down from $29.1 million a year earlier.

multiple challenges

Paul Brewbaker, chief economist at Bank of Hawaii, said many Hawai’i companies are having more trouble staying in the black because of the state’s economic slowdown, but that ML&P faced challenges on multiple fronts.

"It’s going to be difficult for somebody in that part of the economy to thrive right now," he said.

Brewbaker said Maui and the Big Island have suffered the biggest reductions in airlift from the Mainland because of the shutdowns of Aloha Airlines and ATA airline earlier this year.

ML&P and its partners recently renovated the Ritz-Carlton Kapalua hotel at a cost of $160 million, which in part was financed by selling 107 suites in the 463-unit hotel as condominiums to individual buyers.

The company also is developing a luxury time-share project with partners on the site of the former Kapalua Bay Hotel. Several other Maui Land & Pine real estate development projects are planned, though most are still subject to permitting.

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The event is sponsored in conjunction with the County of Hawaii Department of Research & Development. The E Malama Aina Festival is an outgrowth of the Chamber’s successful Ag Expo.

The event’s co-chairs, Steve Shropshire (Aloha Green) and Richard Ha (Hamakua Springs Country Farms) take aim at the compelling need to inform, educate, inspire and initiate consumer action — critical public issues in light of oil’s continued volatility.

“This year our community–and the country at large–face severe challenges. E Malama Aina will showcase innovation in agriculture, alternative energy, transportation, housing, and education in an interactive village environment, offering consumers a unique, hands-on experience,” said Shropshire.

Co-chair Ha added that the organizers have found many on Hawaii Island “who have been engaged in innovative work aimed at sustainability. For example, there’s a progressive small company in Hakalau making hydrogen out of energy generated by river water; Native Hawaiian aquaculture practices are being re-introduced because of its inherently sustainable design; and as traditional farmers, we’re excited to be inspiring our community with simple, do-it-yourself home gardening innovations.”

The event is to have a series of sustainability “villages” staffed by experts in areas critical to our contemporary island lifestyle. A sample section of a “green home” will be erected onsite, showing best building practices, including solar energy and renewable building materials. A miniature ahupuaa is to be on display, depicting land stewardship practices found in traditional Native Hawaiian living.

Additionally, event planners are working with island schools to offer class field-trips to the festival engaging children in interactive sustainability practices first-hand.

Besides all of this, there will be continuous live award-winning Hawaiian entertainment, a variety of food vendors, and a special edition Hilo Farmers Market.

Lalea “Sam” Puluole, executive director of Hilo’s Downtown Improvement Association (DIA), a member of the planning committee said “We are fully engaged in this special event, and are excited to see Hilo town evolve into the E Mälama ‘Äina homebase.”

Aggressive media campaigns are on the way with Oceanic Time-Warner, Hawai’i's cable

television provider reaching more than 400,000 households, through an exclusive media partnership featuring a statewide series of promotional commercial spots. The first of the television promo series features Mayor Harry Kim inviting all of Hawai’i Nei to attend the event. Statewide broadcast will begin in early July, with a special announcement on the Time-Warner OC-16 series “Kamaaina Backroads.”™

Hawai’i Island-based filmmaker Roland Joseph Torres is producing a series of short films profiling Hawaii innovators of sustainability, to be broadcast in segments on Kamaaäina Backroads™ shown in Hawai’i and the mainland, as well as during the festival in November.

“Ultimately, we see this as an opportunity to partner with our larger community in working toward a better tomorrow,” said Shropshire.

For corporate partners, E Malama Aina offers a wide range of opportunities designed to maximize consumer-direct interaction in the first event of this kind in Hawaii.

Sponsorships are being coordinated through the Pacific Media & Learning Trust, contact (808) 333-5764

The E Malama Aina Festival is a project of the Hawai’i Island Chamber of Commerce (HICC). Founded in 1898, the Chamber celebrates its 110th anniversary in 2008. Based in Hilo, the County seat of Hawaii Island, it serves members from East Hawaii as well as member businesses from throughout all of the State of Hawaii, the nation, and internationally.

High and low resolution images are available for members of the media. Please contact Roland at the Pacific Media & Learning Trust, (808) 333-5764

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When I was growing up, soy was something that was pretty much confined to being used on our Chinese food takeaways or something that hippies and health nuts crowed about… that I knew of.

The humble soybean now plays a role in so much of our lives and while it is certainly a wonderful plant, our reliance upon it and exploitation of the land suitable for cultivating the crop has also presented some major challenges.

Here’s the good, the bad and the ugly about the soybean in brief.

Soy – the good.

Soybeans are an amazingly versatile crop, providing oil, carbohydrates and protein. The protein content is around 40%, oil approximately 20% and 35% of a soybean is carbohydrate.

Soybeans can grow in a wide range of soil and as they are a legume, can help restore nitrogen levels to nitrogen depleted earth.

- A food in their own right
- Meat replacement as in Tofu
- Dairy replacement – soy milk and cheese
- Biofuel as a replacement for crude oil
- Stock feed
- Candles
- Soaps
- Cooking oil
- Flour
- Butter (like peanut butter)
- Ice cream
- Chips
- Cosmetics
- Resins
- Plastics
- Inks
- Clothing
- Vodka

During my days as a baker, I used soy flour instead of gluten to give the bread more strength as we had many customers with gluten allergies. If you look on the ingredients listing of many processed food products these days, you’ll likely see soya flour or oil listed.

Even for us omnivores, a meal or two of soy-based meat replacements can go some way to reducing the impact of meat consumption on the environment. Given that products such as tofu absorb the flavors of what it’s cooked with, even a partial substitution is a good way to go if you simply cannot give up meat altogether. The same goes for dairy products.

Candles are often made from petroleum, crude oil, as are cosmetics, plastics and resins – so soy offers an earth friendly (to a degree) alternative to these too.

With so many uses, you’d think that we could just about live on soy alone; but there are some issues you need to know about before you start making radical changes in your diet and general consumption habits by replacing traditional products with soy.
Soy – the bad

While any well educated vegetarian or vegan will tell you soy contains many health benefits, but it is not the be all and end all replacement for meat and dairy. For example, it’s not high in calcium or iron, two critical elements of good health; so these nutrients need to be garnered from other products. Many manufacturers of soy dairy replacements fortify their products with calcium to address this.

Soy also contains appreciable levels of phytoestrogens – plant hormones. There’s a great deal of controversy as to whether a diet high in soy contributes to issues in men such as lowered libido, increased breast tumor growth rates in women with a high risk of breast cancer and soy formula for infants is thought by some to increase the risk of autoimmune disorders of the thyroid gland.

Soya flour has also been shown to cause cancer in rats, but no equivalent human studies have been done.

According to Wikipedia, approximately 8% of children in the USA are allergic to proteins in soybeans, which produce skin irritation in kids sensitive to these.

Back in 2000, a study published in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition stated brains of elderly people who ate tofu at least twice a week for several decades were aging faster than normal.

I’m not any sort of expert on diet, but it seems to me that just about everything is linked to cancer or some sort of malady these days and it’s really more of a matter of "all things in moderation" – and some of the above could be due to a lack of something else that was replaced by soy or perhaps how the crop was grown – pesticides for example.
If you are considering switching to a soy-rich diet, exercise due diligence and research thoroughly.
Soy – the ugly

Probably one of the most disturbing issues of the burgeoning soy industry is the destruction of the Amazon forest and clearing in other countries.
Vast swathes, tens of thousands of square kilometers, of this incredibly important resource are being cleared in order to grow soybeans; primarily for stock feed.
The other link soy has with livestock is cattle farms are being replaced by soy farmers who buy or rent land from cattle farmers. The cattle farmers then push on deeper into the Amazon forest. For those of us who eat meat, this is a double whammy of the environmental impact of our diets.

The lucrative soy market has also seen agribusiness sinking their claws in for control over the crop. Soybeans are a popular biotech food crop, meaning that it’s increasingly being genetically modified.
The biotech companies actually own these variants and no-one can use them without their approval. The danger in this, aside from the unknown long term health and environmental effects of GM crops, and in addition to the legal ramifications of GM crops infecting non-GM crops, is that big business is increasingly controlling our food, and the future of our food. For example, in the case of soybeans, Monsanto has 25% global market share.

The use of soy as a biofuel is another thorny matter. It’s my opinion that food as fuel on an industrial scale is just wrong on so many levels – environmental and humanitarian. It takes an incredible amount of land and feedstock just to make enough fuel to fill up a car. Additionally, food prices are rising around the world due in part to the demand of biofuels. There are better alternatives and I really hope that governments wake up to the fact that food as fuel is going to cause as many problems as crude oil has.

Like anything else we buy these days, just because something is made from soy, it doesn’t mean that soy has been grown sustainably. Exercise caution when buying soy products – after all, if you’re choosing soy for environmental reasons, it would be terrible for you to discover rainforest was recently destroyed in order to make your "earth-friendly" alternative.

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"It’s warmer here, doesn’t rain like it used to. The weather pattern is changing," said Inouye, whose family has farmed in Kula for 75 years.

The lack of tradewinds and tradewind showers in May led to another dry month, on average, across the state, according to data released this week by the National Weather Service.

And with a drier-than-normal summer forecast, there is little relief in sight for farmers already suffering from a lack of rain, climate experts said.

For the first five months of the year, rainfall in Kula is 38 percent of normal, Kamuela on the Big Island is at 34 percent, Lihue is below 40 percent and Waimanalo is at 27 percent, according to the weather service.

Even the wettest spot in the state, Mount Waialeale, received only about 73 percent of its normal rainfall total.

"We’re not looking for any major rain-producing system until October," said Kevin Kodama, a weather service hydrologist in Honolulu.

Kodama said tradewinds might still bring some showers to the windward side of the islands and Kona on the Big Island.

A breakdown in the tradewind system in March and April is partially to blame for the drier-than-normal conditions, Kodama said.

Farmers using state agricultural water in Waimea on the Big Island and on Molokai are being asked to voluntarily reduce their use by 10 percent.

In Waimanalo on Oahu, farmers anticipating a dry summer asked and received the order for a mandatory cutback of 20 percent.

"They requested it because they understand in order to have water throughout the summer, it’s better to start early," state agriculture spokeswoman Janelle Saneishi said.

County water officials on the Big Island asked for a 10 percent voluntary reduction in water usage for Waimea, North and South Kohala, North Kona and Kau.

North Kauai residents in eastern Kilauea are also being asked to conserve.

Central and South Maui residents have been under a voluntary reduction of 10 percent since Aug. 23, and Upcountry Maui nonagricultural users were asked to voluntarily reduce their use by 5 percent.

Maui water spokeswoman Jacky Takakura said little water is flowing into the upper reservoirs in Upcountry Maui, and officials have had to pump water from lower elevations.

Maui farmer James Jones, owner of a wholesale plant nursery, said he is expanding his business by 2.5 acres at the county agricultural park in lower Kula.

Jones said he would have a problem if the county were to ask for a reduction in water usage for farmers, especially since he has taken out a loan.

Maui onion farmer Inouye said the weather turned rainy for a couple of days three weeks ago, destroying much of his crop.

"Farming’s a gamble," he said.

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