Clean energy on the farm: our solar panels

The south of Gran Canaria has a climate that suits mango especially well. The same sun that ripens the fruit is the one we use to produce a large part of the farm’s electricity.

The panels are installed here, not on a distant roof. With them we cut the carbon footprint of the work by 50%. They are not there for the photograph. They are the energy that keeps the crop moving every day.

What they actually power

The farm’s electricity does not go into offices. It goes into what keeps the trees, and the fruit just picked, in good condition:

• Pumping well water up to the planting.
• Automatic irrigation, by drip and mini-sprinkler.
• The cold rooms, where mango is held at 14-16 °C after harvest.

Without that current, water does not reach the roots and the fruit cannot be cooled in time. The panels belong to the same cycle as the well and the cold room, not to a separate chapter.

How we understand sustainability

For us it is not a label or a seasonal trend. It is how we keep growing on the land where the farm began in 1965. Looking after the trees’ surroundings is also how Mogán can still be producing mango many years from now.

The panels sit alongside decisions that are already everyday practice:

• Water from our own well, used carefully, without depending on an outside network for irrigation.
• Our own hives, so the blossom is pollinated naturally.
• The work of our agricultural engineers, under Global G.A.P. and Integrated Production standards.

None of these measures, on its own, changes the picture. Together, and kept up year after year, they are how we understand a good mango: with respect for the land that gives it.