April 10, 2015
CapitalPress.com
7
Idaho processed spud growers take price reduction
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
POCATELLO, Idaho —
Southern Idaho Potato Coop-
erative growers have agreed to
a contract that slightly reduces
spud prices but requires proces-
sors to accept at least 90 percent
of their 2014 acreages with indi-
vidual farms.
SIPCO Executive Director
Dan Hargraves said contract
prices will be down 1 percent for
Lamb Weston growers. He said
McCain and Simplot growers
will take a 1.5 percent decrease
to “make up an inequity from
the prior crop year.”
Hargraves said SIPCO
sought an acreage guarantee
based on slower exports of fro-
zen potato products during the
West Coast port labor slow-
down.
“There were some reductions
by all of the big three in Idaho
— Lamb Weston, McCain and
J.R. Simplot,” Hargraves said,
adding that many nonmembers
took larger acreage cuts.
Growers approved the con-
tract in mid-March, and proces-
sors are now taking it to fields
for signing.
A Simplot spokesman de-
clined to comment, and McCain
hadn’t commented as of press
time.
Lamb Weston issued a state-
ment: “We’re pleased with this
year’s negotiations, and appreci-
ate the time and effort that went
into reaching a mutually benefi-
cial agreement for the contract
year.”
With the latest contract, Har-
graves said prices are down 4
percent over two years, or about
$120 per acre. Prices vary by re-
gion and variety, but Hargraves
said Russet Burbanks will still
fetch more than $7 per hundred-
weight.
Hargraves said SIPCO of-
fered this season’s price de-
crease to all three companies
rather than accepting a request
from Lamb Weston for price
protection, which he said would
have set an unwanted precedent.
The company essentially sought
the right to later reduce prices by
no more than 2 percent if con-
tracts in other regions were to
come in cheaper.
“We didn’t want that lan-
guage in our contract, plain
and simple,” Hargraves said.
“SIPCO doesn’t have any abil-
ity outside of Idaho to influence
negotiations, so why should our
price be subject to that?”
The contract also included
new language pertaining to ge-
netically modified organisms,
mandating that seed and com-
mercial growers dedicate sepa-
rate equipment, farm land and
storage to GMO spuds, and that
they avoid planting convention-
al potatoes in a field for at least
eight years after raising GMOs.
Potato Growers of Washing-
ton reached an agreement with
processors in November. Exec-
utive Director Dale Lathim said
his growers accepted the price
protection language, described
as a “favored nations clause,”
and were allowed to roll over
last year’s contract rates. If oth-
er growing areas agree to lower
contracts, Washington’s max-
imum reduction is capped at 2
percent.
Lathim said Washington
growers were also guaranteed
100 percent of their 2014 acre-
ages.
“It’s not something we have
to look at often, but this was
definitely a year we were con-
cerned about that,” Lathim said.
University of Idaho Exten-
sion economist Paul Patterson
estimated input costs were
down by at least 1.5 percent last
year, and he noted processors
are under pressure to keep costs
down from customers such
as Walmart and McDonald’s,
which have recently raised em-
ployee wages.
Hargraves believes input
costs for growers were actually
up slightly last season, as grow-
ers were forced to add an unex-
pected late-season treatment for
late blight.
Idaho sees potential for winter recharge expansion
Controversy
over beekeeping
standards defused
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
Bill revised to
recommend
best practices
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
SALEM — A bill that
would create standards for
residential beekeeping in
Oregon is one step closer
to becoming law after pro-
ponents defused an earlier
controversy.
During the initial pub-
lic hearing for House Bill
2653 in February, beekeep-
er groups testified against
the legislation due to fears
of burdensome new fees and
regulations.
“We’re really terrified of
this,” Joe Maresh, president
of the Portland Metro Bee-
keepers Association, said at
the time.
Rep. Chris Gorsek,
D-Troutdale, said the bill’s
intent was to set a baseline
for residential beekeeping
rules, which currently vary
greatly depending on the
city.
Some cities ban beekeep-
ing, while others have no
rules to ensure safety and
prevent conflicts, he said.
Since then, Gorsek has
consulted with concerned
beekeepers to overhaul HB
2653’s language and over-
come their objections to the
bill.
The original legislation
simply directed the Oregon
Department of Agriculture
to “establish standards by
rule” for residential bee-
keeping.
Under the new version,
ODA will consult with Or-
egon State University to
write “best practices” for
residential beekeeping, in-
cluding recommendations
for avoiding nuisance prob-
lems.
Those best practices will
then be disseminated to
cities and counties, which
may adopt ordinances con-
Don Jenkins/Capital Press file
The Oregon Legislature is
addressing a bill that would set
best practices for urban bee-
keepers. Cities would have the
option of passing ordinances
based on the bill.
sistent with the recommen-
dations.
“I think we came to a
good compromise,” said
Gorsek, noting that the
amended version of HB
2653 emphasizes voluntary
action by municipalities.
The revised bill faced no
opposition during an April 2
work session of the House
Committee on Agriculture
and Natural Resources and
was unanimously referred
to the House floor with a
“do pass” recommendation.
After that vote, OSU
came up with an “excep-
tionally large fiscal impact”
of $300,000 to implement
the bill, though that fund-
ing may be included other
pollinator-related bills, said
Gorsek.
Due to the fiscal impact,
however, the legislation was
referred to the Joint Com-
mittee on Ways and Means,
which handles funding re-
quests.
The House Ag Commit-
tee also approved a package
of bills to fund bee diagnos-
tics and pollinator health
outreach at OSU during an
April 7 work session.
Committee Chair Brad
Witt, D-Clatskanie, said
the bill was innovative and
commended Gorsek on re-
solving the differences of
opinion “without getting
stung.”
BOISE — The Idaho De-
partment of Water Resources
and state irrigation companies
injected 75,239 acre-feet of
surface water into the Eastern
Snake Plain Aquifer during
their first experiment with
winter recharge, according to
an end-of-season report.
IDWR Planning Bureau
Chief Brian Patton said the
program also helped the de-
partment identify policy
changes and infrastructure
improvements
necessary
to significantly expand the
state’s recharge potential for
future winters.
Recharge involves paying
canal companies to let sur-
face water seep through their
unlined systems, or through
injection wells or basins, to
stabilize groundwater levels
that have been declining by
roughly 200,000 acre-feet per
year since the 1950s.
This winter’s total includes
14,170 acre-feet recharged in
the upper valley by Aber-
deen-Springfield Canal Co.,
Great Feeder Canal Co. and
Fremont-Madison Irrigation
District. In the lower valley,
Northside Canal Co., Amer-
ican Falls Reservoir District
No. 2, Southwest Irrigation
District and Twin Falls Canal
Co. recharged 61,069 acre-
feet.
“Hands down, the best
point that came out of this
past winter was the fact that
theses canals were able to
keep recharge flowing every
single day,” Patton said. “I
thought there would be shut-
downs during extremely cold
weather.”
Patton said canal managers
implemented creative solu-
tions, such as using pumps to
recirculate water stop head-
gates from freezing.
Recharge was shut down
March 5 in the upper valley,
where canal companies made
use of flood control water re-
leased from Palisades Reser-
voir, and it ended March 24
in the lower system due to
the early start of the irrigation
season.
Patton said the state re-
charged 84 percent of avail-
able water in the upper val-
Courtesy of Brian Olmstead
Winter recharge water bound for Idaho’s Murtaugh Lake flows past a weir for measurement in early
November. The state recently finished its first winter recharge program and sees opportunity to expand
winter recharge in the future.
ley, despite losing four days
of recharge while waiting
for the Bureau of Reclama-
tion to grant permission for
canal companies to divert
water prior to the start of the
irrigation season. Patton said
upper valley recharge is pos-
sible in about 50 percent of
years, when water is released
from reservoirs to clear space
for flood control, and IDWR
will prioritize finding a way
to hasten the approval process
for willing upper valley canal
companies.
In the lower valley, where
recharge is possible every
winter, using water that pass-
es below Milner Dam and
can’t be put to other benefi-
cial use, Patton said 19 per-
cent of available water was
recharged. But more than
300,000 acre-feet of available
water spilled below Milner.
The top infrastructure
priority entails improving
a 3-mile section of con-
crete-lined canal on AFRD
No. 2’s Milner-Gooding
system, thereby opening up
the Shoshone Basin recharge
site for winter operations.
An engineering company is
also evaluating how to open
more of Northside Canal
Co.’s system to recharge.
The company now has con-
cerns about winter water
freezing three hydropower
turbines.
Canola debate resurfaces in Oregon
Bill would extend
limited production
for three years
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
SALEM — The controver-
sy over canola has resurfaced
in the Oregon Legislature in a
bill that would extend limited
production of the crop in the
Willamette Valley for three
years.
In 2013, the legislature ap-
proved a moratorium on cano-
la production in the region for
six years due to fears that it
will interfere in the cultiva-
tion of related seed crops.
During three years of the
moratorium, Oregon State
University was authorized to
study canola cultivation on
500 acres annually in the val-
ley.
Under House Bill 3382,
farmers would be permitted to
continue growing 500 acres of
canola for the remaining years
of the moratorium.
Carol Mallory Smith, an
OSU weed science professor,
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press file
An experimental canola field blooms last May near Salem in this file
photo. A bill before the Oregon Legislature would extend the experimen-
tal propagation of canola in the Willamette Valley for three more years.
said research has uncovered
no difference between canola
and other brassica seed crops
such as turnips and radish
in terms of pest and disease
risks.
While the Willamette
Valley has recently faced an
outbreak of blackleg disease
in brassica crops, there’s no
scientific evidence that the
pathogen is related to canola
production, she said during
an April 7 hearing before the
House Committee on Agricul-
ture and Natural Resources.
OSU’s research indicates
that control practices for “vol-
unteer” canola plants that ger-
minate in fields are the same
as for radish and turnips, Mal-
lory-Smith said.
“There’s nothing unique
about canola in that system,”
she said. “It would not need
to be treated differently than
other brassica crops.”
Kathy Hadley, who farms
near Rickreall and Silverton,
said canola has helped “clean”
fields of weeds that are diffi-
cult to kill in grass seed crops
by giving farmers additional
herbicide options.
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