I took a train about 30 minutes outside of Valencia, Spain and visited an orange farm and experienced citrus I’ve never even heard of! Have you ever heard of Buddha’s Hand?
WOW!
It’s a claw of lemon on steroids (but not really. You gotta be careful talking about steroids and food cuz it COULD be true!!)
I hand picked figs and tangerines and lemons and limes and caviar citrus and Yuzu and… #valenciaoranges
!!!
How could I forget that I’m in the sweet oranges capital of the world??!!
The highlight of my visit was receiving a freshly poured glass of sweet Valencia Orange juice straight from the orchard.
NOW… Hard facts…
Spain remains the biggest producer and exporter of oranges in Europe. A high percentage of Spanish production comes from the Valencia Region.
Valencia orange groves cover an area of more than 120,000 hectares but this, however, may not be the best time in history to be a Valencia orange producer.
Orange farms in Valencia are suffering…
Because of their abundance, they also lack a level of cache and are sold for pennies in the store.
And family farms cannot survive on the revenue produced by these miniscule orange sales.
Many family farms can now be seen abandoned as you see driving along the region. And so, farmers have to find alternative ways to create income for themselves.
They are also competing with countries who also grow ‘Valencian’ oranges with a cost of labor that the Spanish just can’t compete with…
Soooo PSA moment…
Support your local farmers, folks!
They NEED you to survive and THRIVE!
Orange ya glad I’m not going bananas over here??!! 
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