" I heard it through the AgLine"

January 5, 2011

 

 

·       Global food prices seen volatile in 2012

·       Ga. ag chief: Congress fix immigration

·       Bayer rolls out Good Growing web link

·       Renegade arborists grafting forbidden fruit

 

 

Global food prices seen volatile in 2012

 

(Associated Press) ROME — The new head of the U.N. food agency said this week he expects food prices to stay volatile in 2012 — and more people to go hungry.

 

Jose Graziano da Silva, Brazil’s former food security minister, took over as director-general of the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization on Jan. 1. He told reporters Tuesday his top priority was to make good on the agency’s mandate: erradicate world hunger.

 

Graziano acknowledged that the anticipated recession in much of Europe this year could affect his effort, with countries possibly renegging on their annual FAO dues. But he said the assessments are relatively paltry and that the main effect the global economic crisis will have on FAO is more work.

 

“There will be many more people getting hungry, unemployed and we will need to find new ways to assist those governments,” he said.

 

Graziano said he expected that food prices wouldn’t rise much but that they also wouldn’t fall. “But volatility will remain, that is clear,” he said.

 

FAO, which is the U.N.’s biggest specialized agency with a $1 billion budget, has been battling the effects of wild swings in food prices that have particularly affected poor countries.

 

The FAO’s food price index hit an all-time high in February. It has since decreased slightly, but experts warn that food prices remain far too high for many poor communities. The agency put the number of hungry people in 2010 at 925 million, the overwhelming majority living in developing countries.

 

Graziano is one of the architects of Brazil’s much-lauded Zero Hunger program, which over the past eight years has helped lift 19 million Brazilians out of poverty. He has said one of his main priorities was to decentralize FAO’s work to the regional and subregional levels, since that’s where hunger is fought.

 

“You solve food security problems at your village, at your town at your neighborhood (level) — not at the global level,” he said. “Nobody eats at the global level. You eat in the restaurant, in the cantina, at your house. That’s where you need to provide those answers.”

 

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Ga. ag chief: Congress fix immigration

 

(ajc.com) – Congress must make a national guest worker program that's easier for farmers to use now that states including Georgia have passed laws targeting illegal immigrants that threaten possible labor shortages in the fields, Georgia's agriculture commissioner said Tuesday.

 

Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black's main recommendation came in a report that lawmakers required his office to produce last year when they joined with Arizona, Alabama and other states in passing harsh laws targeting illegal immigrants. Georgia's main farm lobbying groups opposed the move, arguing that immigration should be left to the federal government and that a crackdown would scare away migrant workers needed to harvest crops in the state's largest economic sector.

 

Its main recommendation echoes longtime complaints from farmers who have called the federal guest worker program unwieldy and expensive, a criticism that became more urgent once state governments launched crackdowns on illegal immigrants. If lawmakers hoped that Black's report would contain easy fixes to smooth over concerns from the agriculture industry, they will be largely disappointed.

 

"The only answer lies in the prospects of a 21st century guest worker program at the federal level that meets the needs of all types of agricultural enterprises," Black said at a news conference.

 

Georgia lawmakers designed the state's law to make it more difficult for illegal immigrants to get jobs. Yet some farmers have warned they are now struggling to find the workers necessary to harvest crops such as onions or cucumbers that are too delicate to be machine-picked.

 

A number of provisions in the law are intended to make it difficult for illegal immigrants to enter the workforce. One section that took effect this month requires employers with 500 or more workers to use a federal database called E-Verify to make sure new hires are legally eligible to work. Employers with more than 10 employees will be required to use E-Verify by July 2013. Other portions already in effect make it a felony offense to use false information or fake documents when applying for a job.

 

A federal judge in June temporarily blocked sections of Georgia's new law pending a legal challenge by immigrant rights and civil liberties groups. Those contested provisions would authorize police to check the immigration status of suspects who don't have proper identification and to detain illegal immigrants. Another section put on hold would have penalized people who knowingly transported or harbored illegal immigrations while committing another crime.

 

Black dismissed one idea raised by lawmakers in Georgia and other states: creating a state-run system that would replace the federal H2A program that grants temporary visas to foreign laborers willing to work on American farms. Black said Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens advised him that such a state-run program would be illegal.

 

Black praised members of Georgia's Congressional delegation for backing bills that he said would improve the guest worker program. He said the federal program should be run by U.S. Department of Agriculture, not the U.S. Department of Labor. He also said that instead of requiring farmers to provide guest workers with housing, growers should be allowed to give workers a voucher to obtain their housing elsewhere.

 

In his recommendations, Black suggested that state agriculture officials could educate Georgia farmers on how to use the federal guest worker program. Many farmers told Black's office that the federal program either would not work for their farms or they heard only bad things about it — or nothing at all.

 

Determining the economic impact of the new law on the agriculture sector remains extremely difficult. Black's report offers some glimpses, though few firm answers.

 

Just over 20 percent of farmers who responded to a state survey said they hired fewer workers in 2011 than the average during the previous five years. Those growers cited factors that included a poor economy, loss of revenue, difficulties retaining workers and a lack of available labor. Black's office said it was not clear whether any of the reported labor shortages were a direct result of the state's crackdown on illegal immigrants.

 

Black said growers blamed labor shortages for causing $10 million in losses, and some farmers pinned the lack of workers on the state's immigration crackdown. Those self-reported figures are imperfect because they came from a relatively small group of farmers.

 

"It shows that we have a problem," Black said. "We can talk about the magnitude of losses, and they were substantial in Georgia, but really I think we get lost in this million versus that million. We have to look at solutions."

 

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Bayer rolls out Good Growing web link

 

(Wire Services) ORLANDO, Fla., -- Bayer CropScience announced the launch of Good Growing Link, a Web-based tracking tool powered by food safety and traceability technology leader FoodLogiQ, Inc.

 

The Good Growing Link helps users identify, measure and improve their sustainability efforts, and provides a tool to merchandise these contributions to customers and other stakeholders. Bayer CropScience expects the Good Growing Link will help the entire food chain demonstrate and communicate its commitment to sustainability—starting at the farm level. 

 

"Agriculture has been and must continue to be focused on sustainability due to the link between the land and growing practices and their impact on the world around us," said Brian Hrudka , food chain manager for Bayer CropScience. "However, we at Bayer see a growing interest from consumers and the food chain regarding the origin of food and how it is produced. That's why we worked closely with FoodLogiQ to create the Good Growing Link—a secure online reporting tool that allows everyone within the food chain, including growers, processors, retailers and food service suppliers, to track, measure, improve and report their sustainability profile.  Perhaps most importantly, it helps users create a sustainability trail marking the operation's progress over time, acknowledging that sustainability is not a destination but a journey."

 

As a member of the Good Growing Link online community, users can enter new data or extract existing data from other sources regarding operational inputs and practices such as water, energy and chemical usages.  The tool collects that data and generates a sustainability report, or dashboard, customized for the downstream customer. Once the report is created, users can create a link directly to their own website for public review or print to satisfy a customer's specific sustainability criteria.

 

"We developed the Good Growing Link," continued Hrudka, "as a tool to help all those within the food production enterprise measure and improve on their efforts to utilize resources carefully and more efficiently in order to continue providing safe, affordable and healthy food to a growing world population."

 

In 2011 Bayer CropScience, in partnership with the National Potato Council, implemented a Good Growing Link trial project with growers and processors within the potato industry, the results of which are being presented at several panel discussions throughout the NPE event. 

 

The Good Growing Link sponsorship, one of several projects within the Bayer CropScience global Food Chain Partnership, is part of its broader commitment to sustainability efforts that help ensure a healthy and abundant global food supply. 

 

For more information on Good Growing Link, visit bayercropscience.us, talk to your local Bayer CropScience representative or call 1-866-99-BAYER (1-866-992-2937).

 

About Bayer CropScience

Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the fields of health care, nutrition and high-tech materials. Bayer CropScience, a subgroup of Bayer AG with annual sales of EUR 6.830 billion (2010), is one of the world's leading innovative crop science companies in the areas of crop protection, non-agricultural pest control, seeds and traits. The company offers an outstanding range of products and extensive service backup for modern, sustainable agriculture and for non-agricultural applications. Bayer CropScience has a global workforce of 20,700 and is represented in more than 120 countries. This and further news is available at: www.press.bayercropscience.com.

 

Find more information at www.bayercropscience.us.

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Renegade arborists grafting forbidden fruit

 

(sfexaminer.com) – Trees make the urban landscape more pleasant. They shade the sidewalk and provide space for birds to roost. But they don’t usually produce fruit — and that’s something a secretive group of amateur horticulturalists in San Francisco is looking to change.

 

“When you take a stroll down the street and there’s all this free fruit, it changes your attitude,” said Tara Hui, one of the founders of Guerilla Grafters.

 

Guerrilla Grafters began early last year when a few dozen members fanned out across The City grafting fruit-producing branches onto ornamental pear and plum trees in four San Francisco neighborhoods. The experiment is still in its early stages, but Hui said at least one Asian pear in Hayes Valley had flowered.

 

“We were so fortunate,” she said. “It formed two little pears!”

 

While the grafters’ activities might seem harmless, Public Works Director Mohammed Nuru said the renegade gardeners are running afoul of the law.

 

“The trees that are in the right of way, they’re not for grafting,” he said. “The City considers such vandalism a serious offense. There would be fines for damage to city property.”

 

Nuru had not heard of Guerrilla Grafters, but said he would ask his staff to investigate. Meanwhile, he added, if the grafters have ideas about urban agriculture, they should discuss them with city officials.

 

Hui said such grafting won’t harm trees. Guerrilla Grafters, which is working on an urban orchard database, assigns a steward to oversee each tree, collecting fruit, pruning it and looking for disease.

 

“We’re hoping it will become acceptable even for the bureaucrats if we have demonstrated success,” she said.

 

Hui acknowledged that fruit trees are messy when their fruit goes uncollected, but she felt sure that San Franciscans will pick whatever fruit they came across.

 

“The advantage of planting productive trees in public places is that there are a lot of people who have access to it,” she said.

 

Hayes Valley resident Mike Smith was playing with his Jack Russell terrier in a neighborhood park Tuesday.

 

Nearby, a row of leafless pear trees each sported a tiny branch fastened to the mature tree with electrical tape.

 

Smith, who had never heard of Guerrilla Grafters, said he would be happy to pick a pear if the trees proved fruitful.

 

“I think that would be great,” he said.

 

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