Romanians Explore Seed Plant Options Foreign Company Is Financed By Spokane-Area Investor Group

Romanian agricultural officials Friday began a tour of Inland Northwest grain companies to consider regulatory changes that would expand a seed company started last year in that nation by Spokane-area investors.

Wheat farmer Fred Fleming, who owns the Reardan Seed Co., said he sponsored the visit to expose Romania regulators to bulk seed-cleaning operations, the use of chemical seed treatments and efficient production methods common in the United States but absent in Romania.

Romania’s state-owned cleaning and treatment plants are much larger than U.S. facilities. But they distribute seed in cumbersome cloth bags, employ 10 times more workers than a U.S. company would hire and prohibit chemical treatments that protect seed from disease when the crop is planted, Fleming said.

The visit is important to Fleming and partners who last July opened the nation’s first private seed plant at Viziru, Romania. The for-profit company plans to give 10 percent of its profits to Romania orphanages, clinics and Bible colleges.

“By improving things for us, we’ll be improving things for the whole country,” Fleming said.

Developing a more efficient, less regulated food industry also may be critical to Romania’s economy, where the devaluation of the national currency has tripled the price of bread since Jan. 1. Romanians currently spend an estimated two-thirds of their income on food.

The agriculture officials toured grain elevators and seed plants in Rosalia, Fairfield, Rockford and Spokane. Next week, they will visit facilities in the Columbia River Basin and Yakima, Fleming said.

, DataTimes