- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Agricultural operations ranging from small family farms to agribusiness giants are feeling the pinch of the California drought, reported Dale Kasler in the Sacramento Bee. Growers are fallowing land, tapping expensive groundwater and rationing supplies to keep their orchards and vineyards alive.
The article said west side farming giant Harris Ranch plans to fallow thousands of acres of cropland and use it's scarce water supplies to irrigate permanent crops: almonds, pistachios and asparagus. The ranch says it will hire at least 1,000 fewer field workers than usual this year.
“The trees are there. They can't be moved, they...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Now that a half-trillion-dollar Farm Bill has been passed by the U.S. Senate and is headed for the House of Representatives, Madeleine Brand interviewed Dan Sumner, director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, to get his take on the Senate action. The nearly six-minute interview aired on Southern California Public Radio's Madeleine Brand Show.
Sumner said the Senate's Farm Bill contains substantial changes in the dairy program, the biggest of which is removal of an ancient price support program. The program, in which the government would buy powdered milk, butter...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
At a Nov. 16 research symposium in Oxnard, hosted by the University of California Cooperative Extension and Hansen Agricultural Center, UC Riverside entomologist Mark Hoddle said that he had completed the testing required to secure federal approval for release of a tiny wasp that preys on ACP, reported John Krist in the Ventura County Star.
The federal government has promised to expedite approval, the article said. Some of the natural enemies - collected in the Punjab, Pakistan - could be carrying the fight against ACP into Los Angeles yards by the end of...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Gravenstein —the jewel of a once-thriving apple industry in the Sonoma County — is in danger, its supporters say, in large part because of another product from Sonoma: wine, reported Jesse McKinley in the New York Times. Director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, Dan Sumner, explained the economics of the cropping shift in Sonoma County.
“If a Gravenstein apple could be sold for 10 times what a Red Delicious could, just as a Sonoma County grape can be sold for 10 times what a Fresno County grape is, you’d be set,” Sumner said. He said the decline of...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The “locavore diet” originally focused on supporting small farms and protecting the environment, says the blog Triple Pundit, however, large grocery store chains and big box discount stores are now writing their own definitions of “local.”
Their definitions include:
- Grown and sold in the same state - Walmart
- Grown within an eight-hour drive of the store - Safeway
- Grown within one day’s drive - Whole Foods
- Produced either in that state or that region of the US - Krogers
- Grown in regions as broad as four or five states - Supervalu (Albertsons,...
