Almond Board CEO Talks About Group’s Mission

An Ongoing Series on the Value of the Almond Industry

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Because it takes a while to harvest more than one million acres, the 2017 almond harvest is still going strong. The Modesto-based Almond Board of California is a federal marketing order charged to market those almonds both domestically and globally. A board composed of 10 grower members oversees committees focused on production research, almond quality and food safety, nutrition research and the environment, just to name a few.

Richard Waycott is president and CEO of the Almond Board. He noted that he’s proud to be part of this massively growing industry. “It’s just been a wonderful pleasure for me, and it’s such a great career opportunity to be part of this industry and try and have vision and work with my board of directors on agreeing on that vision and then with the great staff and all of the industry volunteers we have to implement the vision,” he said.

Waycott is suitably biased toward the almond industry. “We do see almonds as being a crop that should be grown in California. It’s producing a product that should be consumed more by humans,” Waycott said.

“Our efforts to farm more sustainably in the future, than we do today, and to provide for more automation in the industry and better grower practices, et cetera, is what our mission is. I think we’re very much on a road to executing that in a very responsible and an innovative way,” he said

This is part of a series on the big value of the California almond industry.

California Ag Today2017-09-25T16:30:34-07:00September 25th, 2017|

Worker Safety During Nut Harvest – Part 1

Nut Harvest Safety – Part 1

By Patrick Cavanaugh Farm News Director

Safety is very important, especially when working with heavy machinery. As most farm accidents and fatalities involve machinery, farm safety begins with educating and preparing workers for emergency situations, and making them aware of hazards. California Ag Today interviewed Paul Williams, a senior loss prevention consultant with the State Compensation Insurance Fund, regarding nut harvest safety.

“The hazards are primarily with walnuts and almonds. They tend to stir up more dust in the harvest process,” Williams said. “There are respiratory issues that employees need to be protected from.”

“There’s also a need for hearing protection with any type of farm equipment. A lot of times, you’re sitting there all day at elevated levels of noise – there’s potential for hearing loss. Hearing loss is often overlooked because it’s slow acting, but it can have a huge effect on workers lives down the road,” Williams explained. “It’s important to be aware of it as a factor, and we talking about it as one season, probably not going to be any noticeable … you do that for 20 and 30 seasons, and you’re not able to understand your grandchildren when they talk to you. It’s one of those things that sneaks up on you.”

Williams said there are also a lot of safety issues with farm equipment and transportation. “You’re driving a slow-moving vehicle down a county road at 10 miles an hour, and you’ve got impatient drivers who want to pass you. Many drivers are not paying attention at all and they rear-end your equipment,” Williams said. That happened in Kingsburg a couple weeks ago.

This is always a danger whenever you’re transporting harvesting equipment or any kind of farm equipment on a county road. “It’s always nice if you have a pilot car; it’s always nice if you have a truck behind with their flashers on, trying to control traffic and periodically being a good neighbor and pulling over and letting traffic get by you when that’s possible,” Williams said.

For more information on safety on the farm, go to: http://www.agsafe.org/

California Ag Today2017-09-02T23:57:46-07:00August 7th, 2017|

Recharging Aquifers Using Floodwaters

Floodwaters Could Recharge Aquifer

By Brian German, Associate Broadcaster

Last October, the Almond Board of California announced new partnerships with Sustainable Conservation, Land IQ and UC Davis researchers to look at ways floodwaters could recharge Central Valley groundwater aquifers. Daniel Mountjoy is the Director of Resource Stewardship for Sustainable Conservation, an organization helping to solve some of the challenges facing our land, air and, most importantly, water.

Mountjoy explained the idea behind the partnership: “The concept is, ‘Can we capture the available peak flows when they’re available from surface supply and recharge the groundwater so that it’s available during dry years when surface flows are under stress from environmental needs and other demands for it?’ ”

The thought is to use surface irrigation water during times of availability in order to flood almond orchards to recharge the aquifers. This would not only help growers during times of drought, but also benefit those with limited access to surface irrigation. Mountjoy has found some success in their research. The initial focus will be on sandy soils, where the infiltration is really fast.

The concept behind the effort has already shown a level of success on a smaller scale. “In 2011, Don Cameron at Terranova Farms in Western Fresno County captured 3,000 acre feet of water on 1,000 acres of sandy farm land. He infiltrated on pistachios, grapes and alfalfa fields in some fallow land during winter, as well as well into June and July on some of those crops,” Mountjoy said.

Partnerships like these are needed as California begins to fall under the full implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. “What we’re doing with the Almond Board right now is looking for sites in the Sacramento Valley, because there’s more likelihood that we’re going to have water supply there to test the concept. Both UC Davis and Sustainable Conservation are out working with growers,” Mountjoy said.

UC Davis will be working on the crop health aspect, while Sustainable Conservation will be looking into how much water can be put on different crops and what types of management compatibility there is with the crop. Once a significant amount of data is collected, the next step in the process will be looking towards how to further incentivize the method for growers. “Any time you recharge an aquifer, it becomes everyone’s aquifer. There’s still not a system in place to credit landowners for the benefit they are providing to their neighbors and to other irrigation pumpers,” Mountjoy said.

There are over one million acres of almonds stretching roughly 500 miles from Red Bluff to the south end of the San Joaquin Valley. Nearly two-thirds of that land is considered moderately good or better in its ability to percolate water into the underlying aquifers. “We have to prove the viability that you can actually do this on farm land across extensive acres, because that’s really the cheapest solution, rather than buying land, dedicating it to recharge basins and managing it that way without production of crops,” Mountjoy said.

Patrick Cavanaugh2017-01-24T15:09:38-08:00January 24th, 2017|

Almond Sustainability a Priority

Documenting Almond Sustainability

By Jessie Theisman, Associate Editor

Sustainable almond farming utilizes production practices that are economically viable and are based upon scientific research, common sense, respect for the environment, neighbors and employees. The result is a plentiful, nutritious and safe food. That’s what the Almond Board of California is working to achieve along with Joe Browde from SureHarvest.

Joe Browde, of Sure Harvest, Heads up the Almond Sustainability Program for the Almond Board of California

The almond sustainability program uses grower submitted production information to demonstrate the sustainability of the almond industry.

“Some of the benefits have been consistent over time. At the ease of the program, folks can more readily participate in a user-friendly mechanism,” Browde said. “They’ll be able to look at the practices, how they compare to their peers around the state, and see what they can do to improve their performance. Mostly economically, as well as for the environment. The more participation, the more value for the almond board that can tell the industry story.”

“What we want to do is get folks engaged. We want to let them ensure that they see the value individually as well as see the greater value for the whole industry across the state” Browde said.

“Documentation is the name of the game going forward. They just have to get out there and tell their story,” said Browde, who also touched on how sustainability in California isn’t the exception. “It is the rule, and we find the more we look at practices, we’re actually amazed at times at the performance of almond growers across the state.”

“We want to make it as easy as possible, but we also want to make it valid at the end of the day and ground-truth things. It’s going in the right direction. We’re pleased, the almond board’s pleased and we’re going to make a difference,” Browde said.

Patrick Cavanaugh2017-01-19T16:22:52-08:00January 19th, 2017|

Almond Board’s Sustainability Program Gets Even Better

Almond Board Program Streamlined

By Jessica Theisman, Associate Editor

The Almond Board has set a new standard for the Ag industry, according to Joe Browde, a senior research associate for Sure Harvest, which is working with the Almond Board towards sustainability.

It isn’t news that best management practices is the goal of the almond sustainability program, which has been in place since 2010. According to Sure Harvest, “sustainable almond farming utilizes production practices that are economically viable and are based upon scientific research, common sense, a respect for the environment, neighbors and employees.” The result is a plentiful, nutritious and safe food.

Browde gave California Ag Today some insight on this well-known program. “What we’ve done is try to make it more user-friendly, streamline the whole process to ensure the value.” He explained that they wanted to “improve the value of the program so growers can see it more clearly, and handlers, too, as they increasingly assess their practices.”

Sure Harvest made the process more adaptable for all to use. “We’ve made it adaptable to various platforms. Obviously the traditional computer itself, the laptop, but now also well adapted even to smart phones and, of course, other mechanisms as well,” Browde said.

Sure Harvest has created a brand new program to simplify the process. “So if you answer a practice once, it’s auto-populated elsewhere where a similar practice is asked, so it’s all about making life easier for the assessor so they can enjoy the experience more” he said. “They will feel the value at the end of the day.”

Joe Browde also explained the Almond Board of California’s new bee and pollination module. “Brand new one. The bee health and pollination module is specifically desired by ABC … to go with their best management practices guide for bees, and they want to make a big deal on what they’re doing in that realm.”

The main goal of the Almond Board of California and their bee and pollination module is to help consumers understand the value in bees and their importance to the world supply chain of food. “We have developed a new module for that to help them answer those questions and folks can assess. They can use it perhaps even in a verification scheme one day with suppliers” Browde said.

Sure Harvest and the Almond Board are both researching the module. “We’re talking about various ways to help folks throughout the supply chain see the value and to be able to address their various customers” Browde said. Although these studies may still be in their infancies, “we’re trying to figure out the best strategic direction forward with ABC leadership.”

Patrick Cavanaugh2017-01-03T14:10:43-08:00January 3rd, 2017|

Better Navel Orangeworm Spray Coverage

Navel Orangeworm Sprays Tough to Target

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Naval orangeworm is the number one pest in almonds and pistachios, and there’s a lot of research going on to find ways to manage this pest. One important strategy is timely sprays, but Joel Siegel, a research entomologist with USDA Ag Research Service in Parlier, CA, said that it’s tough to get that spray on target.

Joel Siegel

“Spraying for naval orangeworm is learning to live with loss. Many years ago, my professor told me to assume that 90 percent of what you put out never goes where you want it to go. I didn’t know that he was being an optimist when he told me that,” he said.

To confirm this, Siegel set up a controlled experiment sponsored by DuPont. “Using the best setup of spray rigs at two miles per hour, we’re basically getting 10 percent of what we calculated in the tank was actually getting on the nut,” he said. “Then if you add the difficulty of saying, you want to get it in the suture on an early split almond, you’re probably getting about two percent of what’s in your tank actually on that suture zone, so you’re dealing with a 98 percent loss.”

Siegel said the spray is getting in the tree, but not on the nut or the suture of the nut. “I’m talking about just getting on target. It’s getting on the leaves, it’s getting on the bark, it might be getting on the ground.”

Siegel noted that it’s actually better to spray at night, when the naval orange worm adults are flying. “That way, some of the drift can actually contact the adults. The other advantage of night spraying is that the humidity is higher, so you’re not getting that loss of having the droplets evaporate.”

Patrick Cavanaugh2021-05-12T11:02:00-07:00December 29th, 2016|

Almond Alliance Advances Almond Issues

Alliance Advocates for Almond Industry

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

The Almond Board of California does many great things for the California almond industry, most notably marketing annually about two billion pounds of almonds—both domestically and internationally. But there is one thing the Almond Board cannot do, and that is lobby on behalf of this big industry.

Kelly Covello, president of the Almond Alliance

Enter the Almond Alliance of California (AAC) on August 1, 2016. Formerly known as the Almond Hullers and Processors Association (AHPA) and established in 1980, this renamed and revitalized trade organization is the only trade association fully dedicated to advocating for and protecting members’ investment in the almond industry. The AAC will represent and serve growers, hullers/shellers, handlers, processors and allied industry partners.

Kelly Covello, president of the Almond Alliance, said, “Over the last year, we’ve done some strategic planning with the Almond Board so that we can complement one another’s activities. The Almond Board cannot lobby or advocate, and the trade association—the Almond Alliance—can.” Nevertheless, Covello said, “the industry has invested in the Almond Board through their assessment and has great resources available in terms of expertise, data [and] research that we can use to support our policy positions.”

For nearly 100 years, the almond industry has been active in California without a dedicated political voice. “The trade association has always been able to advocate on issues when necessary. The industry has grown; we’re over a million acres now. With the increase in acreage, the number of issues, the visibility and the scrutiny of our industry has dramatically increased,” Covello said.

Ms. Covello currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Agricultural Council of California and serves on two Almond Board of California (ABC) committees: the Almond Quality & Food Safety Committee and the Technical and Regulatory Affairs Committee.

California Ag Today2016-11-23T17:02:09-08:00November 23rd, 2016|

Almond and Pistachio NOW Sanitation Critical This Winter

Joel Siegel on NOW Sanitation

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Last year was a bad year for navel orangeworm (NOW) mainly in pistachios, but also in almonds. If left in the trees, infested nuts become a great reservoir for more NOW to inhabit them.

Joel Siegel, NOW research entomologist, USDA Agricultural Research Service

Joel Siegel, research entomologist, USDA Agricultural Research Service

Joel Siegel, a research entomologist for the USDA Agricultural Research Service based in Parlier, stresses the importance of having a good sanitation plan in place to remove those NOW mummy nuts. “When we talk about sanitation, it should be the foundation for everyone’s nut program. That’s something that you control.”

“In almonds, it’s absolutely essential. Where we’ve taken a look at it in the south, every infected mummy per tree is good for 1 percent damage. So going from one mummy to two mummies, your damage on average increases another 1 percent.”

“It’s also important to destroy the mummies on the ground. You figure, for every eight or nine mummies on the ground, that’s good for about a half a percent increase in damage. Get them off the tree and shred the almonds.”

Siegel noted that while pistachio growers can clear mummy nuts off the tree, the industry has not been able to shred the fallen pistachios effectively. The hard, rounded pistachio shells just bounce around in the shredder machine.

Almond Mummies

“What you can do is shake them off the tree as soon as possible so they’re on the ground where they can start rotting. You get those weeds growing around them. It has been shown that they break down faster in the weeds,” said Siegel.

“Growers disc them in. But if you’re going to disc them in, you have to disc them twice. Again, you’re not destroying the nuts, you are burying them so that NOW cannot lay eggs in the spring,” he said.

The risk of poor sanitation is high. Considerable NOW damage can prevent pistachio and almond growers from earning the premium paid for nuts that are pest-free.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:44-07:00November 22nd, 2016|

Sustainable Conservation Works with Growers and Dairies to Solve Problems

Farmers and Sustainable Conservation Collaborate on Economic Improvements

By Laurie Greene, Editor

Sustainable Conservation helps California thrive by uniting people to solve some of the toughest issues facing our land, air and waters. Everyday the organization brings together business, government, landowners and others to steward the resources that Californians depend on in ways that make economic sense.

“We partner extensively with farmers in California on a variety of issues which focus on how to find, solutions that will solve the environmental issue, but also work economically,” said Ashley Boren, executive director, Sustainable Conservation, which has a home office in San Francisco as well as an office in Modesto.

Ashly Boren, Executive Director of the Sustainable Conservation

“We work with the dairies in California to find manure management practices that work for the farm but also reduce nitrate leeching to ground water, to better protect groundwater quality.

“We help simplify the permeating process for landowners who want to do restoration work, maybe stream bank stabilization or erosion control projects,” Boren said. “We make it much easier to get good projects done.”

“We have a partnership with the nursery industry. This voluntary collaboration aims to stop the sale of invasive plants because fifty percent of the plants that are invasive in California were introduced through gardening, and the nursery industry has really stepped up to be part of the solution on that issue,” she said.

Sustainable Conservation is also doing a lot of work with groundwater. “We think there’s a real opportunity for farmers to help be part of the solution in sustainable ground water management. We are particularly focused on how to capture flood waters in big storm events, and how to spread the water onto active farmland as a way of getting it back into the ground,” Boren said.

Boren noted that she has partnered with the Almond Board of California and other grower associations regarding floodwater management. We actually have a pilot program with Madera Irrigation District and Tulare Irrigation District on helping them with some tools, as well as developing some tools together with them, that will help them figure out how to optimize groundwater management in their basins.

California Ag Today2016-11-21T14:39:08-08:00November 21st, 2016|

Interesting Forecast: Wetter Winter, with Possible Deep Frost?

Weather Pattern in California Could Hurt Citrus, Predictions Say

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Some meteorologists are seeing evidence of weather data on the North Pole that could point to more rain and snow this winter. However it could come with several freeze events, which could hurt crops, especially citrus.

The Global Forecast Center is a group of meteorologists in Northern Idaho that conducts weather forecasting for agricultural interests throughout Florida, California and portions of Texas. In fact, they work closely with California Citrus Mutual.

Tom Dunklee, president and chief atmospheric scientist, Global Forecast Center and its associated “WeatherWatch” service, said, “What we see in our frost outlook is a cold year coming up and a bit of an increase in rainfall, which will make everybody happy. But we may have to pay the price with some very cold temperatures following these fronts.”

meteorologist Tom Dunklee of the Global Forecast Center

Tom Dunklee, president and chief atmospheric scientist, Global Forecast Center

“The rains may be more frequent, but they will not be real big rain producers. They won’t be like El Niño years, where you get an inch and a half of rain or more. They will be cold, wet weather systems that come through, one half inch of rain at a time, followed by a possibility of frost,” Dunklee said.

Dunklee predicts the rain events may be followed by some dry weather for three or four days, then by another front coming through, doing the same thing. “What we are seeing is the type of weather pattern we saw in the late 1960s. It’s been quite a while since we’ve had one of these years shape up,” he said.

“I don’t think we are going to have a “Miracle March.” Instead, we are going to have a warm and drier than average spring. Most of the moisture is going to come in December, January and February, comprising those frequent frontal systems. Most of them will be followed by cool air and showery weather. Then the weather will dry out for three or four days, and the wet weather will return.”

Dunklee spoke of the intrusions of the cold arctic air that could arrive. “We think the intrusions will be from the North and Northeast—from Montana coming down through Nevada, then through the San Joaquin river drainage bringing quite a bit of cold air filtering into the [Central] Valley, and we’ll get the possibility of a hard frost, and maybe a freeze sometime in late December,” Dunklee said.

Dunklee also spoke about an increase in snowpack. “At the 7,000 foot level this year we may see higher than average, about 120% to 130% of average snow fall. It will be on the average of about six or seven feet. It may not actually get that deep at one time, but the potential is there for that,” he said.

“Most of the time it’s going to be about two, three feet of snowfall during the real cold months. Then in the spring it will melt fairly quickly, but it potentially is going to be a good snow pack, a little bit higher than average,” Dunklee said.

California Ag Today2016-12-12T09:19:13-08:00November 14th, 2016|