ANR news blog

Colgate professor holds UCCE up for example

Author Chris Henke used UC Cooperative Extension in Monterey County as an example of how agricultural science has helped the farm industry respond to problems, but that technology transfer can get stuck in a power struggle.

Henke explained the case study in The World's Fair: All Manner of Human Creativity on Display. From what I can tell, the blog is essentially an Oprah-style book club for high-brow, academic tomes and the posts typically are a transcribed Q&A session with an author. The book featured in the blog today is Cultivating Science, Harvesting Power: Science and Industrial Agriculture in California, authored by Henke, an assistant professor of sociology at Colgate University.

"The specific case that I describe [in the book] is an institution known as Cooperative Extension, which is a system of county-based agricultural experts employed by the University of California and most other states in the US," the author said in answer to one of blogger Benjamin Cohen's questions.

In his book, Henke said, he shows how the Cooperative Extension experts became enmeshed in the power structure of the farm industry, enabling its creation and helping it weather numerous crises throughout the twentieth century. However, Henke said it's commonly thought that experts in such situations are in the pocket of vested interests. He emphasized in his book, he said, ". . . the ambivalence on the part of both scientist and growers to work together on some of these problems."

I had to stop here and wonder, who is Henke calling "ambivalent"? This doesn't sound like the farm advisors and farmers that I know.

In answer to another question, the author describes a case study in his book. (I'll use bullet points to present Henke's main points.):

• The EPA designated US agriculture the largest non-point source of water pollution in the country
• Water running off farm fields or seeping into groundwater can carry pesticides and fertilizers
• This is especially true in the Salinas Valley, where chemical inputs are used in heavy doses
• Several areas in the county have drinking water with unsafe levels of nitrate, a key ingredient in fertilizer
• Many suspect that nitrates have made their way into the water supply from farm fields
• UCCE scientists addressed the problem.
• Experiments showed that reduced fertilizer use had no impact on crop yields
• Growers tended not to trust these results - and believed using less fertilizer was too risky

Henke said he developed the concept "ecology of power" to analyze how power structures are created that block the implementation of science.

"You can have all the knowledge in the world, but if you can't use it, it won't make you powerful. What I show is that the kind of power that growers or agricultural scientists can be said to have is literally grounded in the interaction of farming places and the ways that people farm there," Henke was quoted in the text.

Not light reading.

The cover of Hemke's book.

More women in agriculture

The Fresno Bee reported over the weekend that the number of female farmers in the United States grew by nearly nearly 30 percent and the number of Hispanic farmers grew by 10 percent over the past five years. The number of Native American, Asian and black farm operators also rose according to the article, written by reporter Robert Rodriguez. The figures are from the recently released 2007 Census of Agriculture.

In the central San Joaquin Valley, the number of female farmers grew by 22 percent in Fresno County, 16 percent in Madera County, 15 percent in Tulare County and 6 percent in Kings County, the story said. In Fresno County, the number of Hispanic farmers grew 17 percent and Asian farmers grew 29 percent.

For the article, Rodriguez spoke to UC Cooperative Extension small farm advisor Richard Molinar. Molinar told him the growth in the ethnic categories is understandable, but in some cases doesn't reflect change.

"They have always been there, they just weren't being counted," Molinar was quoted.

This time, he said, agriculture statisticians made a great effort to get ethnic farmers to fill out the census forms.

Another reason to love California

After the raucous California budget struggle and an impending drought, Californians might enjoy a tidbit from the Early County News in Blakeley, Georgia. The story notes that the world's expert on brown recluse spiders is a UC Riverside scientist and he is certain there are no populations of the frightening aracnid anywhere in California.

UC Riverside entomologist Rick Vetter has actually published a 4,000-word manifesto on the Web about brown recluse spiders titled "Myth of the Brown Recluse: Fact, Fear, and Loathing." At the end of the tirade, he emphatically states in red, all caps, THERE ARE NO BROWN RECLUSE SPIDERS LIVING IN CALIFORNIA.

A disclaimer notes that the article does not contain the opinions of the University of California, Riverside, rather "the opinions of a highly volatile arachnologist who is bloody tired of everybody claiming that every little mark on their body is the result of a brown recluse bite and who believe with a religious zeal that brown recluses are part of the California spider fauna despite the incredibly overwhelming evidence to the contrary."

Judging from the article in the Early County News, some of this same zeal can be found in Georgia, which also is not considered to be brown recluse habitat. It said University of Georgia spider expert Nancy Hinkle tracked verified brown recluse reports in Georgia from 2002 to 2008. (Hinkle was formerly a veterinary entomologist at UC Riverside.) Only 19 brown recluse spiders were identified in that time and there was only one confirmed brown recluse bite.

I'm still terrified.

Brown recluse spider.

Almond industry's long boom is running out of steam

The Sacramento Bee* reported bad news for California almond growers, but the director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, Dan Sumner, still had encouraging words for the industry.

According to the Bee story, written by Jim Downing, almond prices dropped more than 30 percent from August to December, the market for orchard real estate has gone cold, and the industry expects to be left with a 300 million pound surplus when the 2009 harvest begins in August.

Making matters still worse is a looming drought. West Side farmer John Diener told the reporter he plans to fallow 3,000 acres of land in order to concentrate what water he will have available on his 750 acres of almonds, which represent millions of dollars of investment.

But Sumner expressed confidence in California almonds. The state, he said, is the dominant global almond producer, holding more than 80 percent of the market. There are no serious competitors on the horizon.

"I still think they have a very strong long-term future," Sumner was quoted in the article.

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Speaking of Dan Sumner, the UC Davis ag economist was also cited in a Reuters story today about President Barack Obama's pledge to cut subsidies to big U.S. farm businesses.

Some trade experts believe reducing payments to U.S. farmers would be looked on favorably by the rest of the world and that the move would renew the Doha round of WTO talks. But Sumner indicated that direct payments are not as trade-distorting as other subsidies that go up when prices plunge or crops fail.

"A cut in direct payments would do little or nothing for the talks," Sumner was quoted in the article. "It is hard to see the current (U.S.) leadership moving forward on trade opening or paying much attention to the WTO."

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*The almond story was attributed to the Sacramento Bee, moved on the McClatchy wire and was picked up by various outlets, however, I could not find it on the SacBee Web site.

 

A California almond orchard in bloom.

Getting fruits and veggies from a can

A lot of ink has been splashed on newspaper pages recently extolling locally grown, fresh fruits and vegetables for improving the diet and supporting a sustainable food system. The Modesto Bee today takes a step back and revisits canned fruits and vegetables, which are produced in abundance in the Northern San Joaquin Valley community that the newspaper serves.

According to the story, the canned food industry maintains that canning seals in flavor and nutrients, are affordable, easy to use and available year round. They pointed reporter John Holland to a 2007 UC Davis study that found high vitamin A in canned apricots and in a lesser amount in canned peaches and tomatoes. The canning process, which includes cooking, makes it easier for the body to absorb the vitamin A and lycopene, a substance in tomatoes that is said to prevent cancer, the article said.

While vitamin C can be lost when harvested crops are exposed to water or heat, many canned products are fortified with vitamin C and containers keep the vitamin level stable from then on. Fiber and potassium, the study found, were about the same for canned, frozen and fresh products.

Holland sought comment on the issue from the Stanislaus County UC Cooperative Extension nutrition, family and consumer sciences advisor Terri Spezzano.

"Anything to increase fruit and vegetable intake this time of year -- fresh, frozen or canned -- is a positive thing," she was quoted in the article.

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