SGMA is Risky Business

Farming Life Will Be Difficult With SGMA

From Families Protecting the Valley

The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) is going to make life increasingly difficult for farmers and water districts. Each water district will have to prove it is sustainable within a certain time. Translation: The amount of groundwater overdraft must be reduced to zero over a definite time period.

In order to accomplish this, there are basically two solutions. One, idle (fallow) enough land to reduce the amount to groundwater pumping until the basin is in balance. Or, two, access new surface water supplies to increase the amount available to the basin until it is in compliance. Most basins will probably use a combination of the two methods.

Water districts have the additional task as public agencies to balance their budgets. Water districts that sometimes have extra surface water use that extra supply to sell water to balance the budget. The article referred to below addresses that situation. Merced Irrigation District (MID) is seeking State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) approval to sell water outside its basin.

The California Sportfishing Protection Alliance has protested the transfer before the SWRCB. The reasoning as we understand it is that if MID has water to sell outside the basin, then MID can afford to release more water for the environment.

Is there a solution to this dilemma? We suggest that districts that sometimes have excess supplies try to work within their basin, or with neighboring basins to mitigate the impact of SGMA on the local area. Of course, this will require the potential beneficiaries of this water to pay a fair and equitable price to MID. The MID directors have a responsibility to their constituents who have paid taxes for decades and brought in millions of acre-feet of surface water during MID’s existence.

We hope the Valley and its people can work together to maximize the utilization of our available water. Sadly, as we have seen over the past 30 years or so, that once Valley water is appropriated for environmental purposes (whether legitimate or not), it is lost to the Valley forever.

California Ag Today2020-05-14T16:13:39-07:00May 15th, 2020|

California Agriculture Reeling From Pandemic

Pandemic Continues to Affect California Agriculture

By Tim Hammerich with The AgInformation Network of the West

Through this challenging time for all of us, we have been bringing you weekly roundups of how the pandemic is affecting agriculture around the state. We have a few more of these stories here for you again today.

Most farmers responding to a California Farm Bureau survey reported they had lost sales or customers during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the voluntary survey, 57% said they had seen sales drop, mainly due to stay-at-home orders that reduced restaurant demand. Another 42% of respondents to the survey said they or a family member had seen their off-farm income decline.

The economic impacts of the pandemic include a drop in home construction, which has hurt sales of timber. One California sawmill operator says he has had to cut production in half as a result. Though housing starts have dropped, market analysts say lumber sales at home-improvement stores have been rising, as people take on remodeling projects, including conversion of rooms into home offices.

The flow of U.S. farm exports to China has increased since the two nations signed a “Phase 1” trade agreement in January, but an American Farm Bureau Federation analysis says sales to China have so far not kept pace with commitments in the agreement. The COVID-19 pandemic has played a role, AFBF says, in part because it has slowed U.S. meat processing for export.

(Source: California Farm Bureau)

California Ag Today2020-05-14T14:00:57-07:00May 14th, 2020|

Dairy Farmers Need More Help

Resources from SBA Not enough to Meet Dairy Demand

By Rich Worthington, with the AgInformation Network of the West

Current federal aid programs available to dairy farmers are considered good first steps in helping them navigate the ongoing pandemic and related demand issues, but more will be needed, according to the National Milk Producers Federation.

Chris Galen with the National Milk Producers Federation says the resources provided to the Small Business Administration are not enough to meet demand.

“It looks like that there’s been so much demand on lenders and the SBA that either the websites have crashed, or banks don’t have access to the money because it’s already gone. So, that’s certainly very frustration for a lot of groups like ours that worked very hard to get the money initially a few weeks ago, and then to get this second supplement of money here this past week. But, what I think it illustrates is that there’s a lot of government programs out there to help various entities in the business community, including agriculture, and right now the demands for that, whether it’s the PPP or USDA assistance, are much greater than what the supply of money is.”

“We’re looking at disastrously low prices here this spring for dairy farmers. And unfortunately, the payment formula that USDA has is more weighted towards the first few months of this year, not towards the spring and summer, when we know that farm level milk prices will be at their worst.”

Resources for dairy farmers to learn more about aid programs are available online at www.nmpf.org.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:17:07-07:00May 13th, 2020|

Important Leafy Greens Webinar Scheduled for May 14

Process Underway to Further Strengthen Food Safety Requirements for Leafy Greens

Although leafy greens farmers are facing new challenges created by the Coronavirus pandemic, efforts to strengthen required food safety practices are still moving forward with numerous actions taking place this month.

“California’s leafy greens farmers are hard at work every day implementing new, more stringent food safety practices on their farms,” said Scott Horsfall, CEO of the California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement (LGMA). “At the same time, we’re all focused on further strengthening the food safety standards required under the LGMA to protect consumers and prevent future outbreaks.”

Under a new process created to review and update required food safety practices for farming leafy green, the first in a series of webinars is being held May 14 at 10:00 a.m. to gather input on proposed changes to required practices, or metrics, for ag water. To register, click here.

A subcommittee of industry experts and scientists has been reviewing existing LGMA water metrics since August and has proposed changes to existing requirements. A summary of the proposed changes can be found here.

“Some 30 suggested changes for water use have been recommended by this subcommittee on water,” said Sharan Lanini, of Pacific International Marketing, who chairs the LGMA’ Technical Committee. “The recommendations include updated requirements for drip and furrow irrigation as well as water used for chemical applications. These updates are in addition to enhanced water metrics adopted by the LGMA last year for sprinkler applied water treatments during the last 21 days prior to harvest.”

Below is a detailed list of additional actions being conducted by the LGMA to strengthen food safety practices:

The LGMA has appointed subcommittees to address several topics including water,

equipment sanitation, soil amendments/crop inputs, adjacent land use and proximity to

animals.

These subcommittees include industry experts from both California and

Arizona who are systematically reviewing each section of the accepted food safety

practices as well as other potential food safety issues of concern from a scientific perspective.

The LGMA’s subcommittee on soil amendments/crop inputs has met several times since

December 2019, and is looking to develop more detailed standards to address requirements for existing best practices that include compost applications; other crop and soil inputs; storage, handling and transportation; container ID and tracking; and inputs applied to neighboring properties.

A subcommittee on equipment, packing materials and field sanitation is looking to develop enhanced standards related to harvest equipment, harvest personnel and training that also encompasses human vectored pathogens such as Cyclospora and COVID-19.
The public comment period for water has just ended, and the one on harvest related equipment sanitation practices is open through the end of May. Future comment periods will cover the topics of soil amendments/crop inputs and adjacent property/CAFOs. LGMA subcommittees will make recommendations in all of these areas.

The process for updating the LGMA standards is being facilitated by Western Growers, as an independent party to solicit and collect input from all stakeholders. A public website has been created so all interested parties can engage. A calendar outlining when various food safety topics will be reviewed has been posted.

“The goal is to create unified standards for how leafy greens are farmed using the best science and expertise available from throughout the leafy greens community,” said Horsfall. “Water is just the first topic to be addressed. This same process is planned for other areas of the LGMA metrics.”

Once recommended changes have been finalized through this collaborative process, they will be presented to the LGMA for adoption. Approved updates will become part of the required food safety practices and included in mandatory inspections for LGMA members.

Horsfall emphasized that government food safety audits conducted through the LGMA program are taking place even with the COVID-19 situation. As usual, every LGMA member will be audited about five times this year, with both announced and unannounced field audits, and every farmer will be audited at least once. These audits are already more stringent than they were last year.

“The real work of implementing food safety practices is being done every day by leafy greens farmers,” said Horsfall. “The role of the LGMA is to unify the industry under one common set of science-based food safety practices.”

California Ag Today2020-05-12T12:33:31-07:00May 12th, 2020|

USDA To Buy Surplus Food

COVID-19 Surplus Food To Be Purchased By USDA

By David Sparks with AgInfoNetork of the West

As part of the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program the USDA is fulfilling a request by the American Farm Bureau Federation and in doing so is helping to Feeding America.

The Coronavirus Food Assistance Program includes $3 billion of commodity purchases for food banks. Farm Bureau Economist Megan Nelson says the purchases are part of the aid package to help farmers and consumers.

“This is a really great step in the right direction. This program will definitely help get excess food into food banks, which is going to help out our farmers and help food banks facing huge increases in demands. And, it’s something that American Farm Bureau and Feeding America have partnered to ask USDA to do so. So, we’re very happy that this program is getting legs under it and getting moving,” said Nelson.

The program includes fresh produce, dairy and meat. Nelson says USDA will partner with regional distributors to purchase the commodities:

“The procurement process will follow a more streamlined version of the Commodity Assistance program that’s been in place at USDA for some time now and it’s estimating that it’s going to try to be buying about $100 million per month of each product line item,” said Nelson.

The COVID-19 pandemic has consumers purchasing more food for use at home, than away from home. Through the program, food distributors will provide pre-approved boxes of fresh produce, dairy, and meat products to food banks to keep up with demand.

“This is something that is going to be really helping our farmers to get a streamline supply chain to get products that they are producing in abundance, and get it where it’s needed most and where the demand is. And, that’s why these pre-approved boxes of some of the most perishable foods is really going to help out our farmers,” concluded Nelson.

California Ag Today2020-05-09T15:48:50-07:00May 11th, 2020|

California Cattle Leaders Stay Strong During Pandemic

Cattle Leaders Launch Resilience 2020 Campaign

By Tim Hammerich with the Ag Information Network

In the face of a food system that is under tremendous pressure, the California Cattle Council, in conjunction with the California Cattlemen’s Association, launched a Resilience 2020 Campaign.

Dave Daley is a Northern California Cattle Rancher and Chair of the California Cattle Council. “We just need people to understand how committed we are to continue to do what we’ve done, forever. We’re pretty sustainable. We’re very resilient. We’re in this for the long haul, just like Californians are. And the key there is that we actually continue to produce the food in a safe and wholesome manner, nutritious and environmentally sound. So we’re really proud of what we do. It’s important for California to know that we aren’t going anywhere.”

The combined effort seeks to reassure consumers that California ranchers are well-positioned to produce an ample supply of the safest, most sustainable beef anywhere in the world.

“The challenge we have right now is the processing piece. It’s not raising the beef, it’s getting it processed into market. But it’s there; no need to hoard. There’s beef available and it’s going to continue to move through the system and the pipeline. It’s just a very unusual time. To try and re-tool that on the fly, we’re facing a lot of unknowns is the best way to put it. But the key to the campaign is to recognize we’re in this together, we respect what Californians are dealing with it. We’re going to work with it, we’ll come through it on the other end,” said Daley

Visit www.calcattlemen.org/resilience for more information.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:17:07-07:00May 8th, 2020|

California Pear Growers Committed to Growing Flavorful Pears that Ripen Naturally

California Pear Growers Say No to Anti-Ripening Treatments

California pear farmers have united as an industry with a pledge to never use post-harvest treatments like 1-MCP that impede ripening and create a disappointing experience for consumers.

“California pear farmers are committed to producing pears that offer the best eating experience for our consumers,” said Richard Elliot of Stillwater Orchards. “This is why we’re pledging never to treat our pears with 1-MCP. Which would you rather have–a fresh Bartlett pear that has been allowed to ripen as nature intended or one that’s been treated to last for months in storage and may never ripen? The choice should be pretty clear.”

“What we’ve found in repeated experiments in our lab is that pears treated with 1-MCP take as long as three weeks to ripen and, in fact, they may never get soft and juicy,” explains Dr. Beth Mitcham, a postharvest researcher at the University of California, Davis.

The desire for longer shelf life and waste reduction in the fresh produce industry has resulted in suppliers’ use of 1-MCP. It might work well on items that develop their sugar and ripeness during growth, like apples, but for pears and fruits that ripen after picking, 1-MCP can have adverse effects on fruit quality.

“When a consumer buys a pear treated with 1-MCP it won’t ripen properly,” said Matt Hemly of Greene and Hemly in Courtland. “Unfortunately, the consumer has no way of knowing if the pears they’re buying have been treated with 1-MCP. And they won’t know until they buy the pear, take it home to ripen it only to find it never does.”

California pear season starts in July every year. That’s when shoppers should begin seeing new crop Bartlett pears in-store grown by local farmers. This is also the time of year when imported pears from growing regions in the southern hemisphere or domestic fruit harvested nearly a year ago — often treated with 1-MCP — may still be available and on stores shelves.

IRI/Freshlook retail scan data analyzing the pear category over the past five years shows that since 2015, the pear category overall has seen continued decline. National retail dollar sales have declined $79 million (-16.1%) and volume also declined 62 million pounds (-19.2%)

“We just don’t believe that 1-MCP is a smart choice for pears like Barletts that must ripen off the tree,” said Chiles Wilson of Rivermaid Trading Company.

California pear farmers take care to pick pears at a point when they have plenty of sugar, but they’re still green. Bartlett pears actually won’t ripen on the tree, which means they can be shipped without damaging the fruit. And because California Bartletts are not treated with anti-ripening products, these pears will ripen naturally. Once a consumer brings home a California pear, they can expect to enjoy a ripened pear full of flavor within a few days.

“Reducing waste is a great goal for and is something we should all be doing to help the environment,” said Chris Zanobini, Executive Director of the California Pear Advisory Board. “But all too often we waste food in our own homes when we throw things away instead of eating them. Pears are a wonderful fruit in this respect. Consumers can ripen them on the counter to the desired state of ripeness and then store in the refrigerator until they want to eat them. Pears treated with 1-MCP may be thrown away because they never ripen. This can actually create more waste.”

The California Pear Advisory Board is based in Sacramento, CA and represents all producers of pears in the state. A short video explaining the California pear industry’s pledge can be found here. More information about California pears, pear varieties and pear farmers can be found at www.calpear.com.

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California Ag Today2020-05-06T19:47:38-07:00May 7th, 2020|

West Hills College Farm of the Future Part 2

Students Test New Agricultural Technologies and At Farm of the Future

By Tim Hammerich, with the AgInfo.net

West Hills College’s Farm of the Future is a unique program that provides students with practical, hands-on farming experience.

Director Terry Brase also envisions it as a chance to work with companies where in addition to hands-on learning, students can test new agricultural technologies.

“We also have another side of the farm where we’ve got close to a hundred acres that are made up of smaller plots. Those are the areas that are reserved for student projects,”said Brase. “And that currently we’re actually looking for funding where the project or the company that wants to maybe demonstrate a product will pay us. And pay a group of students to run a demonstration on one of these fields. And the students are directly responsible for the decisions and using the product, coming up with little research demonstration against the control part of the plot to see if it works or not.”

Brase said this gives companies early exposure for up-and-coming products, and the students a career related job during school.

“But I think what it really provides, the real value, is that the students are being paid through like a scholarship to work here on the farm. So they’re making money while they’re working on the farm. This way they’re getting the experience and we’re helping them through school,” Brase said.

Interested students or companies can visit West Hills College’s website for more information.

AgInfo.net is the largest Radio Network in the West with 140 Affiliate Radio Stations.

California Ag Today2020-05-04T20:44:44-07:00May 6th, 2020|

Ag Industry Asked for Fairness In Guest Worker Wage Reforms

Farmer Co-ops Press Fairness for All Producers in Guest Worker Wage Reforms

The National Council of Farmer Cooperatives today asked White House officials to ensure that efforts to reform wages paid under the H-2A agricultural guest worker are equitable for farmers across the country. The call came in a letter to the National Economic Council.

“[T]he Adverse Effect Wage Rate (AEWR) has been one of the greatest barriers and limitations for farmers to successfully utilize the H-2A program due to its extremely volatile and unpredictable methodology. In fact, we have spent many years developing and analyzing various wage alternative proposals,” the letter states.

“We must ensure, particularly in these uncertain times, that we are not artificially creating additional expenses or burdens to the detriment of farmers in certain states,” the letter continues. “There are many farmers that would not be able to survive any additional wage expenses at this time.”

The letter comes after White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows recently stated in media reports that Administration officials were looking at reforming how wages in the H-2A program are calculated.

About NCFC
Since 1929, NCFC has been the voice of America’s farmer cooperatives. Our members are regional and national farmer cooperatives, which are in turn composed of nearly 2,000 local farmer cooperatives across the country. NCFC members also include 26 state and regional councils of cooperatives. Farmer cooperatives allow individual farmers the ability to own and lead organizations that are essential for continued competitiveness in both the domestic and international markets.

America’s farmer-owned cooperatives provide a comprehensive array of services for their members. These diverse organizations handle, process and market virtually every type of agricultural commodity. They also provide farmers with access to infrastructure necessary to manufacture, distribute and sell a variety of farm inputs. Additionally, they provide credit and related financial services, including export financing.

California Ag Today2020-05-06T11:54:05-07:00May 5th, 2020|

Practical Hands-On Farm Ed Experience

Farm Ed for the Future Part 1

By Tim Hammerich with the Ag Information Network

As millions of people are losing their jobs, community college are preparing to help many of them find new skills and new careers.

West Hills College in Coalinga has a unique program that provides students with practical, hands-on farming experience. It’s called the Farm of the Future. Here is Program Director Terry Brase.

“Our goal is that every student that comes through our educational academic classes and courses will get some type of experience on the farm. And as such, it’s a working farm. So we have 23 acres of pistachios,” said Brase. “We have little over 80 acres of row crop that we produce, our own irrigation system. So my role as the Director is to kind of oversee the farm and the academic programs. We try to make the Farm of the Future a demonstration of how technology is used in California agriculture.”

The program has two different pathways. One for agricultural science which includes studies like plant science, irrigation, integrated pest management, and precision agriculture. The other is for more industrial studies like truck driving, heavy equipment operation, food safety, and welding.

“As we’ve seen recently these are essential careers that required proper training,” Brase said.

Please go to West Hills College for more information.