New York State Senator George Borrello has visited the Growers Cooperative Grape Juice Co. headquartered in Westfield, intending to showcase one of Chautauqua County’s biggest draws in its agritourism.
“We have this great opportunity to grow our agritourism business, which is more than the industrial part of farming,” Borrello said. “It’s more about how we bring people here to understand where their food comes from and enjoy the process and to bring some attention to the Growers Co-op and their relationship with local farmers.”
The Grape Growers Co-op is located in the middle of the Lake Erie Concord Grape Belt, spanning from Harbor Creek, Pa., to Silver Creek, and is the largest and oldest concord grape growing region in the world. The Co-op supplies the region’s grapes to places all over the United States, Canada and Europe.
Post-journal.com quoted Borrello as saying: “So many of these farmers are into other crops other than concord. So, to me it’s all about showing how the changes through the market, the Growers Co-op has diversified to strengthen its portfolio, as have all the farmers that make up the Co-op.”