Esteban Macias Padilla is Director of Plant Protection at Grupo U. He serves on the CCOF, Inc. Board of Directors.
Esteban Macias Padilla was born into a farming family in Guanajuato—a state in Central Mexico famous for its agriculture. “I grew up spending a lot of time on the farm with my grandfather, so when I had to decide what to do with my life, I knew I wanted to be a farmer. I also wanted to be an engineer. So I decided to study agricultural engineering.”
After his grandfather passed, Esteban’s father and uncle inherited the family farms. “But my father was a surgeon, not a farmer,” Esteban recalls, “so he rented the farm to other people until I graduated college, and then he handed the farm to me.”
“I started helping at my family’s farm when I was 14. I learned to use a tractor and irrigate crops,” Esteban says. “At that time, I didn’t have much notion of organic agriculture. I just learned the traditional way, the way my grandfather was farming.”
Esteban was farming in a very high-altitude, very dry valley. “I faced the same problems all farmers face. Pests, diseases, high costs… With the little experience I had, I started looking into what technology could give me to solve those challenges. I started using techniques like drip irrigation. But I kept wondering, why are the pests so difficult to control? What were we doing wrong?”
These questions led him to a pivotal moment in his career. Later at an agricultural event, he heard Javier, the owner of Grupo U (where Esteban now works as Director of Plant Protection) speak about the need for change in farming. “I told him that I agree we’re doing something wrong and we need to change the way we do agriculture,” Esteban says. “Javier invited me to become his research guy. He wanted to start a research department because he was the largest vegetable grower in Central Mexico and he was facing the same problems, pests and diseases, over and over.”
Esteban joined Grupo U 29 years ago. “They had warehouses full of chemicals but they still had lots of problems. I started doing research and realized there was a solution in bio control,” Esteban recalls. Even before he started certified organic farming, Esteban tried to solve agricultural problems using bioinsecticides, biofungicides, and biofertilizers—and they worked. “That was very interesting to my boss,” Esteban says.
One of his most significant breakthroughs came with allium white rot, which attacks crops like garlic and onions and can cause farmers to abandon entire fields. “Nobody was having success at controlling that disease,” Esteban remembers. “So I started using plant extracts and beneficial fungi and beneficial bacteria, and there was an improvement on the crops, and fewer diseased plants. Fields that used to be unplantable—we started to produce on those fields again!”
“I started getting a lot of support from the owner of the company because he was seeing positive results on the use of bio control,” Esteban says.
A few years later, they were contacted by Earthbound Farm, a well-known American company in California. “They knew my bosses well and they said, ‘How come you’re not doing any organic production?’ We told them, well, it’s because we don’t know enough about it.” At that time, organic produce wasn’t popular in the Mexican market.
“The guys from Earthbound Farm said they could help us become fully organic and they would be our client, so 20 years ago, we started growing organic as a joint venture. I traveled to California to visit the organic fields, I got the training, and I found it was so complimentary because I was already used to working with bio control. Organic made total sense to me. It allowed me to get rid of the chemical fertilizer and the rest of the chemicals.”
“Farmers are usually scared of getting rid of their chemicals, so I hadn’t been allowed to get rid of them all until that point. But when we started doing organic, it had to be all bio solutions,” Esteban says proudly. “I was able to test a lot more things in a pure way. I was already in the process of changing things in the company because the owner knew that the current way was not the solution, so he was receptive to that.”
They began their organic journey on an abandoned farm that hadn’t been farmed since the last owners’ well collapsed. Luckily, it hadn’t been used in five years and was able to be certified right away as a fresh slate. “It was a small farm, only about 100 acres,” Esteban recalls. “It was very challenging at the beginning because we had a lot to learn, but the Earthbound Farm team was very experienced. Dr. Victor Weggerson traveled to Mexico frequently to guide us through the process. We’ve been certified by CCOF from the very beginning.”
At first, they had to import everything from the U.S. because there were hardly any organic supplies available in Mexico. Now, thanks to Esteban’s work, not only has his company grown (and is adding more organic farmland every year), but he has been able to support other Mexican growers in going organic. “At first, we were unable to find customers for organic food,” he recalls. “But after we started selling to Earthbound Farm, we started selling at local retail too, and we pioneered the idea. Customers found out about organic and started demanding it when they shopped. Once we created a place on the shelf in Mexican retail, other companies stared to offer organic too, because people were asking for it.”
Today, organic farming continues to be a successful move for Esteban. “The yields we were getting 15 years ago, now we are getting twice as much,” he says. “The company is feeling more comfortable to keep on growing.”
Beyond the business, organic is deeply personal to Esteban. “As an engineer, I’m always trying to do things the best way they can be done, but I also do it the same way I’d do it for my family,” he explains. “I wouldn’t give my daughter or my son food that’s full of chemicals. I feel very proud of bringing home good food for my family, and that’s what I offer for everybody in Mexico.”
“For me, the way to go is organic,” Esteban says. “I’m a grower. I’ve worked on fields for 30 years now. It’s been the adventure of my life.”