Creekside Hot House recently announced it will add a 10-acre specialty tomato facility in South Surrey, BC.

The family-run farm is headed by Ravi Cheema, a fourth-generation farmer. “My dad started farming in Canada back in 1977, when he was growing strawberries and raspberries,” Mr. Cheema said. “He eventually moved into a variety of outdoor crops, such as strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and sprouts.”

That farm is called Cheema & Sons Farm Ltd. and today handles the outdoor growing for the family business. Mr. Cheema noted his mother has always been active in the business.

Creekside Hot House today has 15 acres of glass facilities, growing mini-Bell peppers, sweet tooth Ramiro peppers, eggplants, hot chillies, Bell peppers and specialty tomatoes, including Blushers, Sweet Cherry, Gems, Roma and Tastini grape varieties.

The farm is still very much a family operation. Mr. Cheema’s wife, Gurinder, acts as a sounding board for her husband’s ideas and travels with him to produce conventions to find new ideas to bring back to Creekside. “Being a city girl, I never really thought she would have such passion for farming, but today she can’t stay out of the greenhouse for too long and volunteers on the board of BC Agriculture in the Classroom Foundation,” Mr. Cheema said.

His brother also helps out at Creekside when needed.

The company is a niche farm, and Mr. Cheema focuses on taste over quantity. It’s a principle he learned from the man he considers his mentor: BC Hot House Chairman David Ryall. In preparation for the tomato expansion, Mr. Cheema traveled abroad with Mr. Ryall to find the best-tasting tomato varieties.

He describes Creekside’s key values as taste, quality and consumer satisfaction. He combines a search for variety in his growing with strict food-safety measures and an integrated pest management strategy. Mr. Cheema is also very environmentally conscious. A few of the measures he uses to reduce the farm’s effect on the environment include reusing fertilizer, collecting rain water for farm use, using heat storage tanks to store heat during the day to be reused at night and not spraying herbicides.

He is also involved in a project with BC Hot House President Mike Reed. Mr. Cheema said, “We can’t go into a lot of details now, but for my two farms alone, we expect to be using 25 percent less packaging in 2014 with some new technologies to value-added pack our wide range of products.”

Not only is Creekside one of the growers for the 100-percent grower-owned BC Hot House, Mr. Cheema is a director. The association is a happy and productive one from his point of view. He believes customers like dealing directly with grower-owners. He said, “We believe that this model has helped with our double-digit growth over the last three years, with new growers coming to BC Hot House to be part of our team and the expansion from its current grower-owners.”

Mr. Cheema dealt with his own expansion by hiring a lead grower for the new tomato facility. He chose to bring Melina Fillipoff onboard, who is experienced with growing specialty tomatoes.

Mr. Cheema’s vision for his farm includes being a concerned and active corporate citizen. Creekside Hot House donates a portion of its eggplant sales to the Multiple Sclerosis Society. Mr. Cheema chose MS after having two close friends touched by the disease.

The farm also welcomes farm field trips and tours from school districts and teacher chefs. He feels “it is very important for our youth and general public to re-connect with their food and be aware of where their food comes from and how it was produced.”

Mr. Cheema is very involved in his industry. Besides being a director at BC Hot House, he is vice chair of the BC Greenhouse Growers Association and a director on the board of BC Young Farmers Association.

In addition to the difficulties of finding labor for his perishable crops, Mr. Cheema is concerned about the carbon tax in British Columbia. Although the tax has recently been lowered by approximately 80 percent, BC farmers are the only ones in Canada who have to pay it, which does not strike Mr. Cheema as a level playing ground.

However, he is very happy with the role Farm Credit Canada has played in his company. “Farm Credit Canada has been a big support for my operation over the past several years,” he said. “FCC aided in making this new project a reality for me.”