Minh Tran, of Neerabup, is one of eight growers who supplies to WA’s Farmer Jack’s stores that benefited from the supermarket’s pledge to return its profits to strawberry farmers. Tran received $2,520 from Farmer Jack’s this month, part of the $18,000 the stores returned to growers covering a week of trade last month.
The dedicated strawberry grower expressed his gratitude on social media, sparking a flood of comments from consumers. “Many people go through many ups and downs and sometimes it only takes one act of kindness to bring people back belief and instil the sense that there is still a lot of goodness in people,” he said.
Mr Tran has farmed strawberries for more than 25 years after migrating from Vietnam. His son Chad said the needle contamination situation had hit their family hard, but they had come close to recouping their losses.
Chad Tran said it was “depressing” to see growers dump their berries at the peak of the season but he avoided that by opening up the farm for people to pick their own fruit.
Farmer Jack’s senior fruit and vegetable buyer John Zar said the supermarket returned a total of $51,531 to growers —$18,000 of which was profit.
News.com.au reported on a WA Police statement that its major fraud squad was continuing its investigation into the contaminated strawberries and no charges had been laid.
