Local farm to be featured on PBS

COURTESY PHOTO Aaron Troyer, general operations manager for Troyer Brothers, being filmed by a PBS crew. Troyer Brothers, Inc., a potato farm operation based in Lee County, will be featured on a new television program to air nationally on PBS stations around the country this fall. A production crew from "Food Sense" visited the farm recently to videotape harvesting operations and interview key personnel.

"Food Sense" is a new one-hour program launching in the fourth quarter of this year which will air on public television stations across the United States. With news of food source scares increasing, consumers have raised their interest in learning more about where our food comes from and the process of getting food from source to table. The show will engage farmers, industry experts and consumers in a dialogue which will help consumers understand what they are eating from a health, nutrition, taste and value perspective.

The show will be hosted by Phil Lempert, a leading food and nutrition expert known as The Supermarket Guru. He is a regular correspondent for "The Today Show," makes monthly appearances on ABC's "The View," and has appeared numerous times on "The Oprah Winfrey Show," "20/20," CNN, CNBC, Discovery Health and MSNBC, as well as on local television morning and news programs throughout the country.

Troyer Brothers, Inc. is one of Florida's largest potato farms, with approximately 3,500 acres under management. The firm raises white, red and yellow potatoes which are sold locally, nationally and in Canada. The farm is a familyrun concern, owned by brothers Vern, Don and David Troyer.

"PBS's call came at just the right time as potato harvest is in full swing," said Aaron Troyer, general operations manager for Troyer Brothers, Inc. "They were able to get some great footage because from February through April we run full-out getting the potatoes out of the ground and into the marketplace."

The PBS production crew spent the day following a potato from when it was mechanically harvested by a massive tractor, scooped up into a truck and transported to the packing house, washed, scanned, sorted, graded, packaged and then shipped out via semitrailer the same day.