Farmers preparing for frost [Visalia Times-Delta]
Some
of the coldest weather to hit the Valley in more than a year is on the way, and
citrus farmer Bob McKellar is hoping he’s ready for it….So far, it has worked,
but a weather system bringing colder air is expected to arrive today….But
California’s drought is hampering those efforts for some farmers, including
Keller, who explained that he has wind machines and enough well water to water
his 100 acres of citrus near Ivanhoe. That’s not the case for his 82 acres in
the Red Banks area northwest of Woodlake, which has no wind machines, and three
of his four wells are dry. That leaves him with only enough water for
irrigation to try to protect just 10 of those acres from a damaging frost and
more than 70 acres the he can’t protect. In fact, he spent part of Monday
meeting with his employees to decide which 10 acres they would water when the
freezing temperatures hit.
Official:
Groundwater rules won't mean much [Marysville Appeal-Democrat]
Yuba
County water officials and groundwater users should be only minimally affected
by an increase in state oversight of groundwater use, a local water resources
manager said. "In Yuba County, groundwater basins are already being
managed and are sustainable," Scott Matyac of the Yuba County Water Agency
said. New statewide groundwater laws taking effect Jan. 1 will have more
relevance in communities where groundwater has been critically overdrafted,
Matyac said….Matyac said a local groundwater sustainable agency must be
selected by June 30, 2017….Public information meetings will be in Yuba County
during the coming year to lay out requirements and responsibilities for the new
agency….Still, there are concerns from agricultural interests in the county,
especially in District 10 north of Marysville. There are also orchards north
and south of the Yuba River which depend on groundwater supplies during dry
years.
New
rules for Salinas schools — reporting pesticide use [Salinas Californian]
In
the pesticide-laden Salinas Valley, the new year brings a new requirement for
schools and licensed child care centers. Beginning Thursday, all schools and
centers statewide are to report their annual use of pesticides to the
Department of Pesticide Regulation….Though the pesticide industry remains the
most regulated in California, the debate rages over the chemicals’ effects on
health and the environment. More recently, concerns about exposure of school
children to pesticides applied on row crops near schools have resurfaced. A
state report on pesticide use near schools is further proof, health and farm
labor advocates say, that children in the Salinas Valley are at risk. However,
agriculture industry leaders counter that the report is skewed and lacks all
the facts. The report rekindled a call for expanding the buffer zones around
schools that now stand at 500 feet.
Sacramento
Valley’s powerhouse rice crop one step closer to cap and trade [Sacramento Bee]
California
environmental regulators are exploring how rice farmers can reduce carbon
emissions, paving the way for crops to become part of the state’s greenhouse
gas reduction program and affecting one of the Sacramento Valley’s powerhouse
agricultural industries. The California Air Resources Board this month directed
staff to begin the process for including rice in the state’s cap-and-trade
program, marking the first time crop farmers could receive credits for reducing
emissions through a change in growing practices. To sell carbon emission
allowances, rice farmers would be required to flood their fields for shorter
periods. This would reduce the rice straw decomposition process that leads to
the emission of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.
Barbarians
at the farm gate [The Economist]
IN
THE next 40 years, humans will need to produce more food than they did in the
previous 10,000 put together. But with sprawling cities gobbling up arable
land, agricultural productivity gains decreasing, and demand for biofuels
increasing, supply is not keeping up with demand. Clever farmers, scientists
and entrepreneurs are bursting with ideas. But they need money to make this
jump….Farmland has been a great investment over the past 20 years, certainly in
America, where annual returns of 12% caused some to dub it “gold with a
coupon”. In America and Britain, where tax incentives have distorted the
market, it outperformed most major asset classes over the past decade, and with
low volatility to boot (see chart). Those going against the grain warn of a
land-price bubble. Believers argue that increasing demand and shrinking
supply—as well as urbanisation, poor soil management and pressure on water
systems that are threats to farmland—mean the investment case is on solid
ground.
Editorial: Growing into that big
future [Santa Maria Times]
If
you have a teen at home concerned about choosing a good career, we have a
suggestion, and it’s not plastics. It’s agriculture business. Think of a career
in farming as being a way to help this planet produce the food necessary to
feed 11 billion people by the end of the century. When it comes to careers with
a guaranteed future, we can’t think of one with more promise….And that’s where
Allan Hancock College comes into the picture….And those college officials would
be the first to admit that expanding the agribusiness program is not exactly
rocket science, but instead a response to mushrooming demand from local growing
operations for better-trained, skilled, knowledgeable workers.
Ag
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