As we all know the Tomatina is a party where people throw tomatoes at each other, it started in 1945 on the last Wednesday of August while there was a parade in the town square, a group of boys decided to make their way through the crowd to see the parade from a better position to make a spectator fall to the ground by accident, this spectator was enraged and beaten to rage at everything in his path, all this debauchery was dumped on a greengrocer's that was in this place when the spectators began to pick their tomatoes and throw them at each other. That fortuitous act without anyone imagining it gave way to this monumental celebration.
The Tomatina has given rise to a multitude of favorable and unfavorable opinions. In 2015, Nigerian social networks were critical of this celebration for being a waste of food, since more than 120 tons of tomatoes are used for this event, while that same year the country was exposed to a plague, leaving 80% of tomato production caused by a type of moth, thus increasing the value of this food at an exorbitant price.
In 2016, the criticism came from our country, part of the federation of food banks, which from their point of view - it makes no sense to produce food and then throw it away - pointed out that they are not against this type of celebration, but that they could look for another option than tomatoes to avoid provoking food waste.
The tomatoes used as ammunition in the tomato are tomatoes from a company in Castellón, which agreed with the town council to sell the surplus pear tomatoes for this celebration, these tomatoes are planted in April and harvested between the months of July and August. They are tomatoes that do not pass the quality controls for consumption, which if they were not used for the battle would not be harvested and would not be left lying in the field of cultivation giving losses to the person in charge of these fields thus limiting their workforce. It should be noted that they are not tomatoes like those found in our usual place of purchase, they are tomatoes that are too ripe or too old to be picked, and that when they are picked they leave their juice in the hand, which makes it impossible for them to be inflamed or injured when thrown.
In response to this controversy, the mayor of Buñol replied: There may be a diversity of opinions, both favourable and unfavourable, but in Buñol we are proud that there is no activity related to animal mistreatment at our party.