Press Releases

SALINAS, Calif. - Sept 1, 2009 - September is National Food Safety Month, and Rocket Farm wants to help consumers ensure food safety in the home. Food safety has always been an important issue, but with the rise of international trade in food products and issues with food quality for imported produce, knowing where your food comes from is more important than ever.

Rocket Farms believes in the importance of food safety and in the many benefits of using fresh herbs and produce straight from the plant. Rocket Farms wants consumers to understand that that herbs are more than a spice, but they are a food just as any other consumable product. Rocket Farms sells the ten most common herbs as well as tomatoes and other vegetable plants, all grown organically.

To educate people on ensuring food safety, Rocket Farms has assembled the top 5 benefits of using fresh herbs from live plants rather than dehydrated herbs or herbs in plastic clamshells:

1. Nutrition: When produce is off the vine, it is no longer living and it loses nutrition. The shorter amount of time from the plant to the table, the more nutrition that will be packed into your meal.
2. Environment: Plastic clamshells are, well, plastic that fills up our land fills.
3. Quality Control: Living plants are the freshest possible because they are alive when taken home. Everything else starts to degrade the moment it's cut.
4. Pathogens: Pathogenic contamination is transmitted through two vectors: 1) Direct human or animal contact and 2) Contact with infected water. Greenhouse grown live plants have the least chance of contamination compared to outdoor grown and processed plants.
5. Organic: Living plants are grown without the use of pesticides which is not only better for the consumer but better for the environment too.

Some stay away from fresh herbs because they do not know what to do with them once they bring the plants home from the store. They don't need to be planted in the ground, and can just be placed on a windowsill or porch and watered on a regular basis. Having herb plants in the home and cutting the plant when the herb is needed, is a common practice in Europe and will hopefully spread to the United States as individuals become educated on the benefits of this practice.

For more information about Rocket Farms please call 1-(877) 237-7575 or visit www.RocketFarms.com.

### About Rocket Farms
Rocket Farms is a California nursery company with over 25 years of history in the Salinas Valley and California. Rocket Farms is the fifth largest greenhouse grower in the country with over 5.5 million square feet of greenhouse space, distributed over nine growing facilities throughout California. In addition to being one of the largest poinsettia and orchid growers in the country, Rocket Farms grows Living Organic Herbs and vegetables, Mums, Calla Lilies and other cut and potted specialty crops. Rocket Farms travels the globe to keep pace with rapidly changing consumer trends, design, and technological innovations. As part of the company's dedication to its Code of Sustainability and finding solutions for long-term sustainable markets, Rocket Farms has pioneered the shipping of orchids by ocean container and is leading the way in organic production and food safety protocol. For more information on Rocket Farms, visit www.RocketFarms.com.