Western Farm Press. 27 January 2012.  An uptick expected in worldwide consumer spending as the global financial picture improves will likely open the doors for increased sales of U.S. commodities including California almonds.   In the short term, we’re looking at a recession in Europe and a temporary slowdown in China and India and other emerging global markets due to the global economy.  Over the long term, moderate economic growth in Western Europe. China will grow slightly slower, but its move to a more consumer-driven economy will result in stronger consumer spending growth.

This is good news for Western agriculture. The expansion of California nut acreage and production continues to set records. The California almond industry will likely surpass the 2-billion-pound production plateau, an industry record, this year barring significant weather events.

The U.S. is the top California almond customer followed by China, Spain, Germany, and India, respectively. The U.S. purchased nearly 500 million pounds of almonds in 2010/2011. China imported 168 million pounds.  As the worldwide economy improves,  it is predicted that China and other emerging markets including India, Brazil, Indonesia, and Vietnam will buy more consumer goods. This is due to a large number of citizens earning more income and climbing from the poverty bracket to the middle class.  read more 

Growing Produce. 25 January 2012.  One of Americans’ favorite topics of conversation, the weather, was discussed at length at the opening session of the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium in Sacramento, CA, Tuesday.

The opening session, moderated by Hans Walter-Peterson of Cornell University Cooperative Extension, and a columnist for American/Western Fruit Grower magazine, kicked off with a discussion of global warming from Richard Snyder of the University of California-Davis.  Snyder said that global warming is a long-term problem, but a real problem nonetheless. He said by the end of the century we’re looking at a 4 degree increase in Celsius temperatures.  “It’s a big effect,” he said, “I don’t think you want to take this lightly.”

Snyder noted that during the ice age, temperatures only were reduced by 5 degrees Celsius.  Snyder said there could be some good effects. Carbon dioxide, which plants like, will increase, and crops will mature faster.  read more

Yahoo! News.  23 January 2012.  Scientists in Britain and Japan have unveiled a fast-track way towards breeding crops with higher yields or resistance to climate change.  Early beneficiaries should be Japanese farmers who need salt-loving rice plants after their fields were submerged in last year’s tsunami.

The technique unveiled Sunday, which does not use genetic modification, pinpoints DNA variants which confer specific qualities in a plant.  Armed with this knowledge, breeders can then use classic methods to splice these genes into an existing strain.  Right now, it can take up to five or even 10 years to develop a strain, which is known as a cultivar. But the “MutMat” approach should speed this marathon to a sprint of little more than a year, say its inventors.  “Essentially, it helps to get to the needle in the haystack faster,” Sophien Kamoun, a professor at The Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich, eastern England, told AFP.

The method, reported in the journal Nature Biotechnology, focussed on a Japanese wild rice cultivar called Hitomebore.  read more

Western Farm Press. 19 January 2012.  The USDA-NASS California Field Office surveyed California’s tomato processors for intended contract acreage and tonnage for the upcoming 2012 season. The data reported by processors was either in tonnage with derived acreage or acreage with derived tonnage.  As of January, California tomato processors reported plans to sign 2012 contracts totaling 12.7 million tons of processing tomatoes. Processors estimate the contracted production for 2012 will come from 266,000 acres producing an average yield of 47.74 tons per acre.

The contracted planted acreage forecast is 8,000 acres more than under contract in the August 2011 California Processing Tomato Report.  This early processing tomato estimate is funded by the California League of Food Processors in cooperation with the California Department of Food and Agriculture. 

California Agriculture. January 2012. Community Supported Agriculture operations (CSAs) have grown rapidly in recent years. The original model, in which members support a farming operation by paying for produce in advance and receive a share of the farm’s produce in return, has been adapted, with much innovation. Since little research existed on CSAs in the Central Valley, we surveyed and carried out in-depth interviews with 54 CSA farmers and two CSA organizers in the Central Valley and surrounding foothills. Here we focus on four aspects of these CSA operations: type, economic viability, farmer characteristics and farm attributes. We found two main CSA models, box and membership/share. Fifty-four percent of the CSAs reported being profitable, and the average gross sales per acre were $9,084. CSA farmers are diverse in political orientation, yet are generally younger, better educated and more likely to be women than the general farming population. CSA farms are relatively small, with a median size of 20 acres; have a median membership of 60 (585 average); use agroecological methods; cultivate agrobiodiversity; and utilize growing practices that generally meet or exceed National Organic Program standards.

Western Farm Press.  17 January 2011.  California Grapes International, Inc. will work with the American Embassy in Abu Dhabi, UAE to conduct a multi-day California wine event in the cities of Dubai and Abu Dhabi.  “CGI” and the U.S. embassy plan to conduct a series of 4 strategic tasting events designed to develop and secure new trading lines and business ventures into the UAE for California wines.  The planned events are scheduled for the week of Feb. 20, 2012 and include specific targeted audiences of trade professionals, corporate buyers and regional distributors that generally understand and appreciate the value of California wines.

With the events being hosted or co-hosted by the American Business Council, American Chamber of Commerce, MMI (a leading Dubai distributor of California wines) and a special reception hosted by the U.S. Ambassador to the UAE, we are very excited about the opportunity and support for the establishment of ongoing trade relations in the UAE with quality offerings of California wines from California Grapes International, Inc.

“This opportunity presents an excellent platform to highlight samples from some of the very best U.S. wine producers who would not normally be exposed to a market like the UAE.  The intent of this exchange is to introduce the diversity and quality of U.S. wines, not only to the UAE, but throughout the region,” said Michael Burnett, commercial officer.  “The markets in Dubai and Abu Dhabi offer a tremendous location for education, promotion and exposure of the high quality wines being produced in California. As the largest import/export destination in the Middle East, it also provides for a very strategic location for opportunities into other untapped markets for CGI,” said Jeffrey Crittenden, CEO of CGI.  read more

Growing Produce. 11 January 2011.   Last week at the Southeast Regional Fruit & Vegetable Conference in Savannah, GA, the topic of food safety garnered several sessions in the educational tracks. As the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) was signed into law more than a year ago, William C Hurst, a professor and Extension specialist at the University of Georgia, discussed how a new food safety plan that includes “Hazard Analysis” and “Preventive Control” will be a part of the new law.

“This plan (the Hazard Analysis Preventive Control program) is a prevention-oriented, risk-based tool that is designed to identify, control, and document hazards,” said Hurst. “You need to prove by documentation that you have control over those hazards you have identified.” Growers must identify any hazards from the time they plant the seed through to harvest, and then assign a control measure (i.e., sanitation step) to each defined hazard, he added.

A control measure is a physical, chemical, or other factor that can control or minimize risk. “Once you create a control measure, you have to go through monitoring and record keeping,” said Hurst. “You need to document that you have control of the hazards.”  For example, Hurst encourages growers to take samples of their irrigation water, have it analyzed, and then keep track of the results of the analysis. “This is documentation that your irrigation water is safe,” he explained.

Hurst was quick to point out to the growers in the room that the Hazard Analysis Preventive Control program isn’t a stand-alone food safety program. The new program is HACCP (Hazard Anaylsis Critical Control Point)-based, but geared to fresh produce. He compared these programs to a heavy oak table with the safety program as the top, supported by four legs, the “prerequisite programs” — GAPs (Good Agricultural Practices), SOPs (Standard Operating Practices), SSOPs (Sanitation Standard Operating Practices), and GMPs (Good Management Practices) — that need to go along with it.

For example, he said the “Guide to Minimize Microbial Food Safety Hazards for Fresh Fruits and Vegetables” or “GAPs document” (1998) from FDA tells growers what to do to minimize pathogen contamination, but the document doesn’t tell them how to get the job done. An SOP indicating that harvest and packing lines must be cleaned daily to prevent product cross contamination provides growers with the “how-to” information they need to accomplish good agricultural practices.  The principles of food safety, added Hurst, are the same for all growers. These programs can be tailored for small, medium, and large operations. “It can be done and it needs to be done,” he said.  read more

Western Farm Press. 11 January 2011.   In a year when cantaloupe tainted with the bacterium Listeria monocytogenes killed 30 people, the discovery of a compound that controls this deadly bacteria — and possibly others — is great news.  Cornell researchers have identified a compound called fluoro-phenyl-styrene-sulfonamide (FPSS) that is safe for mammals but stops Listeria in its tracks. It interrupts a mechanism that controls genes that are expressed when the bacterium experiences a rapid change in its environment.

The discovery, reported in the November/December issue of mBio, a journal of the American Society for Microbiology, offers new directions for basic research on how L. monocytogenes and other bacteria survive in a wide range of rapidly changing hostile conditions, from fluctuating temperatures to the low pH levels found in the human stomach. Also, there is a strong possibility that FPSS eventually may be developed as a drug to combat listeriosis and other bacterial infections.

“This is absolutely the most exciting work in my career to date,” said Kathryn Boor, Cornell professor of food science, the Ronald P. Lynch Dean of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the paper’s senior author. Mary Elizabeth Palmer, Ph.D. ‘09, a former graduate student in Boor’s lab and now at Vitamin Research Products in Carson City, Nev., is the lead author.

For a foodborne pathogen to infect a human, it must be able to survive rapid changes in its environment, ranging from cold of refrigeration and heat from cooking to highly acidic stomach conditions and osmotic and anaerobic states found in the small intestines. To do so, L. monocytogenes and certain other bacteria employ a “stress-responsive alternative sigma factor” called sigma B, which controls more than 150 genes, including those that contribute to virulence and survival in host-associated stress conditions, including genes essential for the bacteria to cross the gastrointestinal tract, according to the study.  read more

Western Farm Press. 9 January 2012.   The cotton industry — and Congress — will have several options for pursuing a new farm bill over the next few months. Unfortunately, most of them are less than ideal, says the National Cotton Council’s chief Washington spokesman.  John Maguire, the NCC’s senior vice president for Washington Operations, said the industry probably “missed an opportunity” in the proposal submitted by the House and Senate agriculture committees to the Select Committee on Deficit Reduction back in November. The Select or “Super” Committee failed to act on it or any other deficit reduction plans.

“The Joint (or Select) Committee process would have locked in ag’s contribution to deficit reduction of $23 billion,” he said. “While more than agriculture’s fair share, it is significantly less than any other plan made public during 2011 and is probably well below what we think will be proposed in 2012.”  Speaking at the Beltwide Cotton Conferences’ general session in Orlando Wednesday morning, Maguire said the proposal developed by the ag committees offered producers a choice of programs tailored to fit their region and crop mix rather than a one-size-fits-all program.  The proposal also included a shallow-loss revenue insurance program, known as STAX, which was developed by the cotton industry to maximize use of limited budget resources and serve as a basis for the resolution of the U.S.-Brazil WTO case.

“In summary, the Joint Committee produced a plan with timely, predictable and flexible policy, including a cotton program that meets the unique requirements of the cotton industry,” Maguire noted. “Unfortunately, that opportunity may have been lost.”  While it is possible that the ag proposal developed for the Joint Committee could be added to a legislative vehicle early this year, it is more likely the development of a new farm law will be conducted under what is known as regular order. That is, full hearings, mark-ups, floor debates with amendments, passage, conference committee, more debate, amendments and votes and signature or veto by the president.

That could take most of 2012, and there is no guarantee, according to Maguire, that the legislation could survive a floor debate in the House of Representatives. Meanwhile, 2012 will be a short, legislative year because of the congressional and presidential elections in the fall.  read more