California Ag Network

Category: Ag Legislation

  • National Dairy Board Scholarship Applications Being Accepted

    Applications are being accepted for college scholarships that are awarded by America’s dairy farmers and importers through the National Dairy Promotion and Research Board (NDB). Eleven scholarships worth $2,500 each will be awarded, as well as a $3,500 James H. Loper Jr. Memorial Scholarship to one outstanding recipient. NDB funds, in part, Dairy Management Inc. (DMI), which manages the national dairy checkoff program.

    Undergraduate students in their sophomore through senior year for the 2021-2022 academic school year and majoring in one of the following fields are eligible: communications/public relations, journalism, marketing, business, economics, nutrition, food science and agriculture education.

    Scholarships are awarded based on academic achievement, an interest in a career in a dairy-related discipline, and demonstrated leadership, initiative and integrity. Candidates must complete an application form, submit an official transcript of all college courses, and write a short statement describing their career aspirations, dairy-related activities and work experiences.

    Applications can be found at www.usdairy.com/about-us/dmi/scholarship

    Completed applications must be received no later than May 7 at 11:59 p.m. CST. Questions about the program can be submitted to ndbscholarships@dairy.org

  • Yellow Leaves In Spring Indicative Of Need To Adjust Nutrient Management

    California Avocado Commission — In spring, as California avocado trees begin to bloom, growers often report seeing yellow leaves at the ends of branches of otherwise healthy trees. Dr. Danny Klittich, of Redox, recently posted an online article about the yellowing of leaves in spring, what this indicates, and what growers can do to remedy the situation.

    When avocado trees begin producing flowers, the blooms become major sinks for nutrients — gathering the nutrients they need to set and retain fruit. The timing of fruit development also coincides with the cooler months of the California avocado growing season, when growers tend to fertilize less and the soils, adapting to cooler temperatures, tend to provide less nutrition to the trees. Thus, trees begin to reallocate nutrients from the roots and leaves to the more important task of developing blooms for fruit set. With nutrients reallocated, leaves on the ends of branches may begin to yellow.

    According to research, nitrogen, zinc and iron leaf concentrations were lower in chlorotic (yellow) leaves. This makes sense when you consider the importance of each of these to bloom and fruit development. In general, Dr. Klittich recommends that trees should yield a fall tissue sample of 2.5 – 2.7% nitrogen for higher yields. This level provides the tree with an adequate reservoir for bloom development.

    Dr. Klittich recommends growers complete the following to improve yield potential.

    • Early bud development — During cauliflower bloom and floral elongation, apply nitrogen, zinc, iron, boron and calcium.
    • Bloom spray — Nutrient applications should provide calcium, zinc, iron and amino acids and can be made from cauliflower stage through full bloom
    • Fruit set — Weekly applications should be designed to support fruit set and development

    To view Dr. Klittich’s specific product and dosage recommendations, as well as an informative video concerning avocado bloom strategies, visit his latest online article.

  • Preventing & Managing Wind Damage In CA Avocado Groves

    California Avocado Commission — When it comes to potential wind damage, California avocado growers typically face two different scenarios: chronic wind exposure or severe wind events.

    Avocado trees housed in windy portions of a grove are often stunted and underperform production wise.  They also may be water stressed, which will impact the uptake of minerals, and their roots may be stressed due to consistent rocking caused by the wind. The only remedy, in these cases, is to create a wind shelter that minimizes wind exposure.

    In windy groves, fruit often will exhibit markings that can be mistaken for diseases or pest damage. For example, black marks caused by wind may be mistaken for anthracnose post harvest rot or russet scars may lead growers to suspect their trees have persea thrips damage. While some superficial wind damage may not affect the quality of the fruit – particularly if that damage occurs when the fruit is young – some wind damage can lead to large scars or “alligator skin” that are more impactful to fruit quality.

    Severe wind events often blow avocado trees over. In these instances, unless the tree is very young, consider removing the tree. Attempting to move the tree back into an upright position can further damage the roots. If the fallen trees looks like it will recover, it can remain where it is. New shoots may emerge from the trunk and form the structure for a new tree. If this occurs, large, old branches can be removed later as the new portion of the tree takes shape. If you do remove the tree, avoid planting a new tree close to where the old tree existed unless you remove the stump and sterilize the soil. The roots from the old tree could become infected by Phytophthora root rot and thus infect a new tree.

    Strong wind events also can break limbs or blow fruit off the trees. After a storm, windfall should be properly disposed of and broken branches removed.  It is important to monitor trees after severe storms, paying close attention to signs of wilting that may indicate stressed roots or a broken branch that was missed during earlier assessments.

    For more information about preventing and managing wind damage, visit the California Avocado Commission’s wind protection online library.

  • California Avocado Commission Referendum Announced

    Every five years the California Department of Food and Agriculture holds a state-mandated referendum vote to provide California avocado growers the opportunity to determine whether the California Avocado Commission will be reapproved to continue for the next five years.

    “The referendum process is a vital component of the law that established the California Avocado Commission,” said Rob Grether, chairman of the CAC board of directors. “It provides growers the opportunity to cast their vote on continuing the operations of the organization.”

    Ballots will be mailed to eligible California avocado commercial producers on February 15, 2021 and must be postmarked and sent to CDFA for tallying by March 16, 2021. Eligible commercial producers who do not receive a ballot should contact the CDFA Marketing Branch staff at 916-900-5018. Results are expected to be tallied by CDFA and announced no later than March 31, 2021.

    “The California Avocado Commission exists to support California avocado growers and is governed by a board of directors comprised of their peers to ensure good stewardship of grower funds,” said CAC President Tom Bellamore.

    The Commission focuses on fostering grower viability by building demand for California avocados at a price premium and increasing the fruit’s perceived value, preference and loyalty. About 70% of CAC’s current budget goes toward marketing, which includes developing strategic, targeted programs with retailers and foodservice operators. Other key activities include advocating for California avocado growers on issues such as water, trade and export, supporting production research and grower education.

    There have been eight reaffirming referenda since the establishment of the California Avocado Commission in 1978.

  • UC Davis Launches $3 Million Project to Improve Farmworker COVID Safety

    California’s 800,000 farmworkers have been hit hard by COVID-19, the disease that has infected more than 25 million people and killed more than 420,000 in the United States. Farmworkers are especially vulnerable to the airborne virus that causes COVID-19 because they often live, work and carpool in close quarters with other people. As essential employees, farmworkers have stayed on the job during the pandemic to plant, process and harvest the nation’s food.

    Agricultural safety experts and communicators at the University of California, Davis, have launched the COVID-19 Statewide Agriculture and Farmworker Education Program to reverse that trend. Funded by a $3 million contract with the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency, the project provides workers, growers, farm labor contractors, community groups and others the training and safety information they need to reduce farmworkers’ risk of contracting COVID-19.

    The COVID-19 project is led by experts at the UC Davis Western Center for Agricultural Health and Safety, who are collaborating with the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Communications Team, a network of community-based organizations, and agricultural industry groups.

    “Our team will work directly with community organizations who are trusted by farmworkers and have already been assisting them throughout this COVID crisis,” said Heather Riden, program director at the Western Center for Agricultural Health and Safety. “Our goal is to amplify their efforts and help them build capacity as they continue to provide critical COVID safety information to their communities.”

    The team is also working closely with farmers and others in the agriculture industry as they navigate state COVID-19 workplace safety standards, establish protocols and provide employees the tools they need to stay safe on the job.

    “As employers across the state implement that new COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standards, we want to be a resource for them so they can take all the necessary steps to ensure a safe work environment,” said Riden.

    The program will be especially active in areas of high agricultural employment, such as the Central Valley, the Imperial Valley, Napa Valley and fertile regions along California’s south and central coastlines.

    Free trainings and other events are already underway. You can learn more and register for upcoming presentations on the UC Davis Western Center for Agricultural Health and Safety website. The center also offers extensive COVID resources and information in multiple languages on its COVID-19 Resources page. — By Diane Nelson, UC Davis

  • Secretary Ross Orders Referendum of QIP Sunset Plan

    United Dairy Families of California — Yesterday Secretary of Agriculture Karen Ross signed a Decision of Order to hold a referendum on the petition submitted by United Dairy Families of California (UDFC).

    The petition is a producer-derived plan to sunset the Quota Implementation Plan (QIP) effective March 1, 2025 and to equalize Regional Quota Adjusters such that the quota premium in all counties equals $1.43/cwt.

    The Secretary’s signature confirms the proposed decision from Judge Timothy Aspinwall stating that UDFC’s “petition must proceed to a producer referendum.”

    According to information posted on the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) website, “the referendum voting period will be March 4, 2021 – June 1, 2021,” to ensure full participation among dairy producers.

    The petition was born out of a multi-year effort led by UDFC, a producer-led organization seeking to unite the California dairy industry. The organization held over twenty meetings around the state and solicited input from hundreds of producers to determine a path forward for the QIP.

    UDFC submitted over 300 signed petitions from dairy producers to CDFA, which initiated the referendum process.

    United Dairy Families is pleased with the Secretary’s decision to affirm the recommendation, and looks forward to encouraging all California dairy producers to cast a ballot in the forthcoming referendum.

  • CA and Denmark Sign MOU on Climate Smart Dairy Collaboration

    CDFA Secretary Karen Ross and Minister Rasmus Prehn of Denmark’s Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) focusing on dairy innovations and technologies addressing climate change.  The signing event, which was held virtually, included agricultural stakeholders from California and Denmark, and featured a presentation from the Center for Policy Research on Energy and the Environment at Princeton University.

    “In California, we have invested more than $264 million in Climate Smart Agricultural programs focusing on the dairy sector over the last five years,” said CDFA Secretary Karen Ross “This has resulted in more than 236 projects that will achieve a reduction in CO2 emissions of more than 23 million metric tons of CO2 equivalents over 10 years.”

    “This partnership with Denmark on climate smart dairy collaboration will help to connect farmers, academia and government on the shared challenges related to methane emissions in the agricultural sector – providing the foundation for action and innovation in the future.”

    This MOU continues CDFA’s international collaboration on climate smart agriculture activities. Over the last few months, the department has conducted webinars with Portugal (Lisbon and Tagus Valley) and South Africa (Western Cape). This adds to the ongoing work over the last five years which has included more than 10 webinars on climate smart agricultural issues with a variety of international partners.

    Read the MOU here

  • Drink Your Peas, Please!

    USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientist and director of the Western Regional Research Center (Albany, CA), Tara McHugh and her team in the Healthy Processed Foods Research Unit are experts at solving food-manufacturing problems. Using cutting-edge processing technologies, they have helped numerous small businesses, such as Ripple Foods, turn ideas into products for the consumer.

    ARS is helping Ripple Foods optimize its current pea protein drying process to make it more efficient and to further improve its products. The company manufactures its own pea protein by processing yellow split peas into a liquid form and then isolating, purifying, and drying the protein. The pea protein is then made into non-dairy milks, protein shakes, half and half, ice cream, and other products.

    The drying step is necessary because producing this clean-tasting plant protein in a wet state comes with challenges: It’s difficult to transport, has a greater risk for microbial spoilage, and has handling issues, McHugh said.

    “It’s also expensive to ship all over the country, so we are working to optimize the drying process—looking at a way to dehydrate it so it can be rehydrated to save expenses,” she said. “The drying process also may even improve the quality and flavor of the final product.”

    Ripple Foods has a cooperative research and development agreement with ARS, which assists the company in data gathering and analysis on different aspects of its pea beverage. “Ripple’s mission is to make plant-based foods delicious,” said Aminah Johnston, a process engineer with the company. “We are always looking for ways to make our protein and products better. Our collaboration with ARS has been extremely helpful.”

    This kind of research not only supports small businesses and U.S. growers, but also reduces waste and increases consumption of healthy foods.—By Sandra Avant, formerly with USDA-ARS Office of Communications.

  • Drier La Niña Winter Conditions Can Contribute To Sudden Freezes

    California Avocado Commission — Although the California avocado growing regions are expected to experience a moderate La Niña phase with warmer average temperatures through spring 2021, the lower rainfall amounts associated with this climate phase can lead to sudden cold spells or freezes. As Dr. Ben Faber noted in a recent blog post, some of California’s most severe freezes have occurred during weak La Niña phases.

    Advection and radiation freezes pose the most threat to California avocado groves. Advection freezes are caused by the movement of arctic air into the region. Radiation freezes occur at night when clear skies and calm conditions are present that allow cold pockets of air to settle in low areas of the grove.

    To prepare for potential frosts or freezes, it’s important to remember that different prevention measures may be used for a frost versus a freeze. A frost is caused when objects cool at night and radiate their heat loss, thus chilling the surrounding air. In Southern California, warm air is typically close to the ground due to a low ceiling, thus causing a temperature inversion that protects orchards. However, windy conditions can disrupt this inversion and press cold air to the ground. In comparison, a freeze occurs when cold air moves in and the air temperature decreases at both high and low levels.

    • To prevent damage when cold weather events are in the forecast, consider the following.
    • To protect against frost or freeze, orchard heaters can be used to distribute heat. The downside of heaters is the cost of running them and possible fire hazards.
    • Wind machines should only be used in frost, not freeze, conditions and should not be used when it is windy. This economical option can be paired with orchard heaters to improve effectiveness.
    • If frost threatens and no temperature inversion is present, the best practice is to run microsprinklers during the day and turn off the water prior to sunset. If the temperature drops below freezing, restart the water and run it until sunrise. If ice forms on the fruit or leaves, heat will be released as the ice melts and protect the plants.
    • If watering the entire grove prior to a cold weather event is cost prohibitive, it is recommended that growers opt to water only those portions of their groves that tend to be coldest.

    If your grove is affected by a frost/freeze event, please view Post-freeze Avocado Grove Management on the California Avocado Commission’s website. For more complete information, visit the Commission’s online library of frost/freeze protection articles.

  • Using Satellites to Improve Sustainability, Yield

    Two of the nation’s great agricultural regions are the focus of new research that aims to head off emerging threats and improve sustainability.

    Scientists with the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) are joining colleagues to create and use artificial intelligence to help farmers in the Colorado River Basin and Salinas Valley, CA, improve their management of irrigation, fertilization, and pests. USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture funded the University of California, Riverside-led project with a 5-year, $10 million grant.

    “This project will integrate multiple satellite and meteorological data sets to help farmers in the Southwestern United States,” said Ray Anderson, a research soil scientist with the ARS Agricultural Water Efficiency and Salinity Research Unit in Riverside. Anderson leads the ARS portion of the study, working with ARS scientists Todd Skaggs and Andrew French.

    ARS has three primary roles in the project: To calculate project area crop water use and anomalies with crop water use across the entire region; develop tools that help growers avoid salinity damage while minimizing the leaching of fertilizer; and to gather field data to validate satellite algorithms.

    Researchers will take advantage of advanced satellite technology to provide more frequent, detailed information to farmers than ever before. The plan is to integrate high-resolution commercial satellite data with established government satellite platforms and meteorological data.

    A major advance with this work will be the use of daily, high-resolution (12-foot) satellite imagery, Anderson said. Previously, data have only been available every 1-2 weeks at 60- to 100-foot resolution and were too infrequent or coarse to provide timely and actionable information to farmers.

    “By combining the new satellite data with artificial intelligence, we will be able to discover and create tools that will help farmers pinpoint areas that need better irrigation, nutrient, and pest management,” Anderson said.

    “One of the major advantages to this project is that the outputs – recommendations and highlights on a smartphone app – will be accessible to all farmers,” he said. “Previously, farmers had to pay for aircraft and specialized processing to get this level of imagery and detail. Soon, high resolution satellite imagery, machine learning, and cloud processing will be available to smaller producers in one easy-to-use tool. These algorithms will help farmers with their field scouting so that they can catch problems early, before significant yield reductions occur.”

    Agriculture in the Colorado River Basin and Salinas Valley employs more than 500,000 people and generates roughly $12 billion annually in revenue. Farmers in the regions grow fruits and vegetables that are shipped around the country all year round, particularly in winter.

    Water availability and use top the researchers’ priority list because prolonged drought has reduced agricultural water availability in the southwestern United States.

    “These valleys consume large amounts of irrigation water, but the amount and quality of irrigation water is decreasing,” Anderson said. “It is important to use existing supplies more efficiently and to protect water sources from nutrient and salinity contamination that can come from poor irrigation management.” — By Scott Elliott, USDA-ARS Office of Communications.