The world’s most consumed fruit hides a fascinating and untold story. Long before globalization took hold, the humble tomato was already being industrialized, transforming into a commodity as essential as wheat, rice, or oil. Its versatility—powering products like ketchup, pizza sauce, soups, and frozen meals—made it indispensable.
By 1897, a decade before Ford revolutionized car manufacturing, Heinz was already mass-producing tomato puree, pioneering branding strategies, crushing unions, enforcing strict production standards, and developing genetic labs to create uniform plantations worldwide.
Today, no matter where you are, you eat the same tomatoes. This film follows tomato paste’s journey across Africa, Italy, China, and America, exposing the true consequences of this billion-dollar industry.
Original Title : The empire of red gold
Director : Xavier Deleu & Jean Baptiste Malet
Watch the video by Best Documentary
Video “Red Gold : The Global Tomato Conspiracy” was uploaded on 04/05/2025 to Youtube Channel Best Documentary
I investigated what Heinz Canada claims it's Canadian ketchup is made with and they "claim" to only use Canadian tomatoes. This is good news if it can be believed. As I have no real way to know what the truth is other than a Google search I'm kind of screwed. As the robber baron Rupert Murdock is the current owner and is only concerned with profits I fully expect he will try to, if he hasn't already done so, to find a way to get Chinese tomato paste into what we eat here.
It truly disgusts me that these money hungry elites who already have more money than they could ever spend continue to gut out the good middle class jobs in their seemingly blind pursuit of the global communist "paradise".
Today is election day in Canada and I've got my fingers crossed that we can get rid of the WEF stooges, the liberals, that have been running this country into the abyss for the last decade.
As the former "dear leader" Turdeau said, ON CAMERA, he admires communist China because "they get things done". He was and is a traitor to his country and people.
That is the true story of the economy of wealth in the world. The farmers in some countries know how to unite in oder to add value to the efforts. If not, someone will rise to the occasion
Grow your own food – its so easy and inexpensive.
A little surprised that the program bemoans the automation of the tomato industry. Clearly they never worked in the fields under a hot sun. The children of the bracers workers now work in clean air conditioning Mexican factories making cars and trucks.
It's all OVER. Once you allow American or Asian GMOs and Bioengineering of food into your country YOU ARE DOOMED! NOW EUROPEAN FOOD WILL BECOME POISONOUS LIKE AMERICA.
And then along came Donald Trump to turn the tomato cart over. The New Silk Road is doomed & the Chinese people better start eating those tomatoes themselves because soon it will be very hungry in China.
The varieties genetically engineered for mechanical harvesting are HORRIBLE. I grow 16-20 heirloom tomato varieties because the California varieties are like eating styrofoam. I buy canned Itialian San Marzino which are hand picked and delicious compared to any other canned tomatoes.They cost more but are well worth it.
The most importan information is around 40:00
I seldom use tomato concentrates as they give us heartburn 🫣🫣. So Spaghetti is a rare meal in our home
do mayo and mustard too
They grow these toxic plants in Xinjiang near the old Lop Nur nuclear test site (and other sites). They deliberately do this to poison the world. Notice the Chinese DO NOT eat this stuff themselves.
Great Britain 🇬🇧had “ the war of the roses 🌹 “
China had “ the tomato 🍅 war “ and a Terracotta Army. Sounds like a gardener’s nightmare.
I remember selling baskets of tomatoes as a kid that were homegrown and brought in in the summer we're the best tasting tomatoes ever I've been trying to find anything that compares in all stores and there is nothing
Boycotts are the only way to deal with this s***
Sweating cheap labor in the US
Good to know. Won't be buying Heinz or canned tomato products from now on. I boycott any products that I know are from China, especially using slave labor. I already don't buy food with tomato sauce in it. Fresh farm stand or home grown for me.
55% not tomato is a scam. Its almoat half not tomato sauce. Is criminal
4:55 blues music is universal, a toiling man's solace…
The brutal brutal truth is that no matter if you want to change to a different product you don't even know cuz there's only six corporations that own everything in the in the world so where do you how do you change your product to make a difference you know makes it really difficult as a consumer to have a conscience and do the right thing.
bought by a chicom general
Italian no longer means anything
I haven't heard from any nutritionist to say the tomato's most important nutrient is not available to the human body's metabolism until it is boiled. But you have to wean masses off of using pharmaceuticals as a magic bullet. That's not a simple task if they've been socially conditioned to believe that status and leisure are gateways to health and wealth.
Mmmm. Soybean fibre…..without being shown on the label.
Red Gold is a brand of tomatoes that are grown and marketed from Indiana. They are extremely high quality and have nothing to do with the tomatoes that are talked about in this video. I'm going to tip them off about this video and its title because I think they should ask for you to change it and if you won't they should sue you.
Westerners became big sellouts….really,really sad!!
It's a criminal world…….cocaine dealers cutting product with baby powder .. tomato paste makers in China cutting with soy bean fiber and additives .. NOBODY fixing nothing!!!!
What a Trivial story…Pays the bills I guess
After seeing documentaries like this one, one cannot hardly keep from wondering what they world will be like when China surpasses the US as the world power. How will China behave? China seems like a far more racist society than the US, with no laws that are reported on in the US about racial discrimination. Then again, we get our information from a biased American media – and the US was horrible racists in its past. Could the Chinese be worse? What is the real deal with the minorities in China, and the areas China has taken over and imported Han Chinese to?
It's pretty obvious that China is smarter and more organized than the US, and works to better the lives of their people more than the US.
We need real valid unbiased information and to understand and make peace because the world cannot take more World Wars.
I have huge respect for China, and I know a lot of Chinese people. We have to all learn how to get along, and to fix our governments.
I just discovered Compari tomatoes in my local stores. They are like large sized cherry tomatoes, and they are so great.
Compari tomatoes are my new favorites.
The Chinese ought not be consipring with companies to hide additives in their tomato sauce, that is not right.
What an eye opening video. I enjoyed it, very informative and educational. Please watch. Thanks for the upload.
52:14 The lies keep on coming. The company he works for advertises itself as "fair trade".
Where ( what timestamp ) do they talk about Warren Buffet?
I love tomatoes, but I'm so out of the market of buying them. I grow my own but it's difficult where I am. I tried Italian canned whole tomatoes canned, figuring they have to be better than the white atrocities at the store, but they aren't. If I knew a brand that wasn't horrible, I'd buy it. I really miss tomatoes.
Up to 55% of a can of Chinese tomato sauce or paste may or may not be filler like soybean powder with out indicating it on the ingredient label. Solution – don.t buy Chinese.
The Red army😂
Italian traders buy hazelnuts from turkish traders and sell them to the world as if its italian hazelnut.
Never buying Heinz again, Chinese slave tomatoes.
If you have not planted hundreds of trees, whose air are you breathing? If you do not grow your own tomatoes, then you must buy someone else's, from what is available or go without.. This applies to everything.
they work so well helping proteins bind with carbs in the gi tract
Ovaj Kinez je nečovek idemo dalje, sedi u toj stolici kao diktator….. Fuj….. 😮😮😮
God only knows what the “general” & his company put in those tomatoes not mention the CANS
BUY ORGANIC BUY LOCAL
The kommie tomato company is “trusted” by all the BIG NAME companies I NEVER buy from 😂😂😂 good look foolish humans