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Greenland: land of ice goes green as warming turns the cabbages into kings
Lasse Bjerge lives in a remote, sub-Arctic valley that is flanked by barren mountains, 20 miles by boat from the nearest town and perishing cold even on a bright September day. There, for the past two years, he has cultivated one of the world’s most improbable market gardens.
As a bitter wind whistles past his red wooden cottage, Greenland’s first commercial vegetable farmer proudly lifts the synthetic sheeting protecting his crops to reveal rows of cabbages, cauliflowers and — appropriately — iceberg lettuces. This summer he even produced a few strawberries.
It is not easy, admits Mr Bjerge, 50, who began this experiment to supplement his sheep farmer’s paltry income. He was late buying his seedlings last spring because the fjord was choked with ice. There were frosts and freezing nights as late as June. His broccoli, in particular, has struggled to survive the harsh climate.
Now, thanks to Mr Bjerge and two other pioneering farmers, Greenlanders can buy fresh green produce for the first time — not the tired, limp stuff flown in at exorbitant cost from Denmark. Mr Bjerge breaks up a compact cauliflower head. “Taste it,” he says. It is crisp, sweet and full of flavour, because it has taken weeks to ripen in the long, cool days of a far northern summer.