A regular feature from our president – Duncan Allison

FARMING NOTES – DECEMBER 2014

Christmas and Thanksgiving are occasions for families to get together and enjoy some good traditional food. It is appropriate that we remember our farmers are almost all farm families producing our food, not faceless corporations. Field crop producers enjoy some down time during this season after the struggle and long hours to get crops harvested. Dairy and livestock farmers and mushroom growers are not as lucky as you cannot turn off the milk tap, not sustain animals with the food and water they require every day and stop mushrooms growing.

Not many businesses are so demanding as farming or fraught with the vagaries of the weather and climate, swings in market prices and challenges to manage production profitably, supply increasingly demanding markets and meet government regulations.  So those of us who are not actively farming, let us hope our farming readers enjoy the Christmas holidays and wish them best wishes for 2015.

Farmland preservation – The last few years have seen less loss of farmland to development due to the recent economic downturn but we can expect that developers will be soon looking out for land that can be covered with houses. Our region is highly attractive with all its amenities and quality of life, so close to major population areas. We also have some good farmland that needs to be kept producing food for future generations.  There has been widespread acceptance that farmland preservation and open space protection are very worthwhile objectives. Significant funding has been available for farmland preservation even during the last few years of depression.   Our region has made impressive progress in preserving farmland but it has not been enough. The fight must continue if we are to maintain our local and regional farm economy for future generations.

Delaware has 129,163 preserved acres, mostly in Kent and Sussex counties. The state was losing 9 acres every day to development but major efforts have succeeded in preserving over 25% of total farm land.  New Jersey has 209,734 acres or 29% of farmland with most preserved acres in Salem, Hunterden, Warren and Burlington counties.  Pennsylvania claims to lead the nation in the number of farms permanently preserved for agricultural production with 4,500 farms and over 500, 000 acres preserved. Chester County has an estimated 70,000+ acres of preserved farmland or almost 43% of total farmland. Government programs and land trusts have preserved over 32,000 acres and non-profit land trusts the remainder.  Farming Notes will explore how each state funds these programs in another issue.

Sustainable agriculture – Sustainability is the popular buzzword in agriculture at present and there are conferences, videos and many articles on the subject. It has also been the theme of all the Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture meetings and visits this year. Our (PSPA) speaker last month, Eric Haman, Corporate Communications Director, Clemens Food Group, started with people as the first topic for discussing the sustainability of workers at the Clemens plant and on their 100 farms to succession at the very top of the company.  A large farmer on a recent video I watched also highlighted people as being critical from the difficulty of getting workers, ensuring that a succession plan was in place for the farm and educating the “best and the brightest” to work on our increasingly high tech farms  and in our large agriculture industry. Issues touched on by other farmer speakers included the need for research and the availability of good land (for rent or purchase) to sustain the larger units often required so as to spread investment costs for equipment and the latest technology.  We were told that Walmart, Sysco and other major retailers and food distributors want to see changes on the farms which are supplying them. They are requiring sustainable practices wherever possible – treatment of employees, use of fertilizers, pesticides, diesel etc. Farmers have the challenge of “going green” while still making a profit. Any new practice must be economic. The large farmer panelists were very conscious of the popular antipathy to large farms and preference for small farms. They all agreed that farmers had a responsibility to be transparent “nothing to hide” and to confirm, by their farming practices, that “farming is indeed an honorable profession”.  Clearly sustainability has many facets but our industry will be increasingly scrutinized by food and produce companies, government and consumers to ensure that what we offer is safe and produced sustainably. It is not only doing the right thing but communicating it as well.

Antibiotic resistance is another area of public concern as we need to ensure that these vital tools to maintain livestock health are available. This has become a huge challenge in human health as the medical health profession relies on them “as antibiotic resistance could affect any of us.” According to Dr. Frieden, CDC Director “two million Americans get resistant infections each year; 23,000 Americans die from infections each year.” In addition “600,000 cancer patients receive chemotherapy so their natural defense systems are wiped out and they depend on antibiotics to protect them from microbial infection until their natural resistance returns.”  The inference for livestock seems to be to limit antibiotic use for health reasons and use drug families that are not used in human medicine, such as ionophores as feed additives.  In a recent conference Craig A. Lewis, DVM MPH DACVPM, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, presented background information on the US FDA’s antibiotic regulatory activities for human and animal health. Dr. Lewis says antibiotics resistance is a complex topic. There are many gaps in understanding the science of resistance and the future requires a collaborative approach to create and develop solutions. “There are problems to be solved and tensions to be managed”, says Dr. Lewis as he outlined rules, regulations, and discussions around antibiotics.http://www.swinecast.com/dr-robert-tauxe-antimicrobial-resistance-and-the-human-animal-interface-the-public-health-concerns

Cranberries – good example of a super-saturated market when production is not geared to demand. Wisconsin produces about two-thirds of the crop and production was up 25%. The state had asked the federal government to implement mandatory production limits so that supply would not outstrip demand too much. This was denied and as a result of the bumper crop, the federal government is purchasing 68 million pounds ($55 million) of cranberries in all the cranberry states including New Jersey. The challenges of government involvement!

DAA 12/19/2014