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CapitalPress.com
May 19, 2017
Editorials are written by or
approved by members of the
Capital Press Editorial Board.
All other commentary pieces are
the opinions of the authors but
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Opinion
Editorial Board
Editor & Publisher
Managing Editor
Joe Beach
Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com Online: www.capitalpress.com/opinion
O ur V iew
New organic rule about science or ideology?
T
he Department of
Agriculture has announced
it is delaying for six
months the effective date of the
Organic Livestock and Poultry
Practices final rule and reopening
it to comments, reigniting a
debate over what it should
include, and the essence of what
it means to be organic.
Is it about science, or is it
about ideology?
The rule amends the organic
livestock and poultry production
requirements by adding new
provisions for avian living
conditions and livestock handling
and transport for slaughter. It also
expands and clarifies existing
requirements for livestock care
and production practices and
mammalian living conditions.
According to proponents,
the rule seeks to align organic
livestock, poultry and egg
production practices
with consumer
“expectations.”
That seems a bit
subjective as a
standard. What do
consumers expect?
And aren’t those
expectations subject
to change without much
notice?
Though never stated, a
secondary purpose of the rule
seems to be to limit the size of
organic livestock and poultry
operations by increasing the
amount of outdoor space
required. The more outdoor space
required, the less any given farm
can produce.
A happy byproduct of the rule
would be to limit supply
and maintain the
premium for organic
products.
The target, we
suspect, are the
large so-called
“factory farms”
producing under the
current organic standards.
Those farms produce commercial
quantities at an economy of scale
smaller operations are unable to
match.
For purists, those farms — even
if they follow the letter of the law
— are anathema to their idea of
organic production.
While we respect the sentiment,
we’ve always believed the rules
should be both secular and scale
neutral. The proposed rule is at
least half that. The rule is bad for
bigger farms, good for smaller
producers who benefit from a
relative scarcity of the product in
question.
The USDA takes a more
optimistic view: “The new detailed
standards for the non-ruminant
(poultry and swine) sectors will
support the continued growth of
organic poultry, eggs, and pork in
particular.”
We’re not so sure the rule will
do anything to increase the amount
of product available to consumers.
It will ensure that the economies
of scale will be limited, and the
definition of “large” will be altered.
The Organic Trade Association,
which represents 350 producers,
supports the rule. We agree with it
when it says there’s nothing new
that will be learned in the extended
comment period. There are no new
arguments to be made.
“Any additional comment
period,” it says, “will only serve
to demonstrate that the organic
industry and consumer want the
Organic Livestock and Poultry
Practices rule to become effective,
in its entirety.”
If that’s the case, the rule as
written will be adopted. Giving
USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue
a little time to digest what has
already been said won’t hurt.
More agricultural
research funding needed
O ur V iew
By THOMAS GRUMBLY
For the Capital Press
I
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
The 8,000-acre Murtha Ranch along the John Day River near Condon, Ore., was purchased by the Western Rivers Conservancy for $7.9 million.
The group sold it for the same price to the Oregon State Parks Department, which developed it into Cottonwood Canyon State Park. As a nod to
traditional uses, hunting and fishing is allowed, and state officials are developing a grazing plan that may be put into effect next spring.
Land sales have big
impact on ag economy
T
here’s more to an agricultural
land sale than a willing buyer
and a willing seller.
A farm or ranch changing hands
can impact neighbors and the local
economy almost as much as the parties
directly involved.
That’s why when ag land goes up
for sale it’s a big deal — far more
important than just dollars and cents.
Last week, reporter Eric Mortenson
took a look at the sale of agricultural
land across Oregon. What he found
was the price of exclusive farm
use land — a designation used
by the state to identify the best ag
land — has skyrocketed in recent
years as it changed hands. Some
remained orchards, vineyards, farms
or ranchland, but other tracts were
taken out of production for a variety
of purposes including conservation,
recreation and even a state park.
In each case, the sale can have a
profound impact. Some examples:
• Neighboring farmers and ranchers
see the price of expansion increasing,
potentially beyond their means. At the
same time, the comparable value of
their land continues to grow, impacting
their finances.
• The area where the state purchased
ranchland for conversion to a state park
has seen mixed impacts. Neighbors
have seen the pool of grazing land
shrink, but nearby towns have seen the
number of visitors increase.
Overall, the biggest impact is when
land is taken out of production.
Because agricultural land is more
than real estate, buyers and sellers need
to take the local economy into account.
For example, taking vast swaths
of ranchland out of production will
impact other ranchers and their ability
to graze livestock. If livestock is no
longer raised, that will impact the
economy. Equipment will no long be
bought or serviced in nearby towns.
Seed and fertilizer dealers will see
the number of customers shrink.
Cattle will no longer go to market,
impacting livestock auctions.
Considering that the average age
of farmers across the West is about
60, what happens when agricultural
land changes hands takes on added
importance.
Whether land stays in the family
or is sold to absentee landowners,
how it is used profoundly impacts the
region.
Overall, the best case scenario is
the land will remain in agriculture,
supporting ranchers, farmers and the
economy.
Whether, or how, that can be
mandated will remain a continuing
debate across the West.
Readers’ views
Snake River dams:
Sky is not falling
The April 14, 2017, Cap-
ital Press had a front page
banner headline “$1 Billion
Question. The lead article
claimed the state of Oregon
proposes to reintroduce endan-
gered salmon and steelhead
above Idaho Power Compa-
ny’s Hells Canyon Dam on
the middle Snake River. Idaho
Power Company and various
irrigation representatives were
reported as claiming this could
cost Idaho water users a bil-
lion or more dollars.
A follow-up editorial in the
April 20 edition of the Press re-
peated those claims and called
Oregon’s proposal “cock-
eyed” and questioned Oregon’s
“obsession with fish.”
There is one small problem.
Those claims are false. As in
not true. Moreover, the people
making them know they are
not true. It is a matter of record.
Oregon has not proposed
and does not intend to rein-
troduce salmon and steelhead
that are on the list of endan-
gered species. False claims
to the contrary are simply
designed to scare people and
dupe decision makers.
Idaho Power gambled on
a highly controversial fish
passage plan when it built
the dams that blocked a vast
area of salmon and steelhead
habitat. As predicted, the plan
failed with disastrous econom-
ic and ecological consequences
extending hundreds of miles
downstream and thousands of
miles along the Pacific Coast.
The Hells Canyon Com-
plex of dams is undergoing
relicensing. As token mitiga-
tion for the ongoing damage,
Oregon proposed to restore
salmon and steelhead in a few
small streams that enter the
project reservoirs. The fish
used will not be on or be el-
igible to be put on the list of
endangered species.
Oregon 401 Water Quality
Certification would require Ida-
ho Power Company to evaluate
and recommend fish stocks for
the reintroduction program for
Oregon approval. See ODEQ
401 Cert, section IX.E http://
www.deq.state.or.us/wq/sec-
401cert/docs/hcwqcert.pdf.
The sky is not falling. Ida-
ho Power, Idaho Water User’s
Association, Boise Valley
and Owyhee Reservoir water
users, Idaho’s Committee of
Nine, Idaho Irrigation Pump-
ers Association, and Idaho
Groundwater
Association
named in the article should
be ashamed of themselves for
claiming otherwise.
Ed Chaney
Executive Director
Northwest Resource
Information Center
Eagle, Idaho
t’s the midpoint of the
avian flu season, but
poultry farmers in the
U.S. are starting to sigh with
relief.
After worrisome strains
of flu were found in chicken
flocks in Tennessee, Alabama,
Georgia and Kentucky — the
heart of our country’s “broil-
er belt” — no more infected
birds have been found and
warnings are beginning to
lift.
The last large-scale out-
break of avian flu occurred
in 2015. Efforts to control
an avian flu outbreak in the
U.S. included the culling of
48 million birds, flock by
flock, when just one bird
or two on a farm became
ill.
Most of the carcasses had
to be burned to facilitate dis-
posal. While that outbreak
fortunately did not sicken
any people, the economic
impact totaled $1.2 billion.
A growing number of
wheat farmers are starting to
worry instead. Wheat blast,
a hard-to-control fungus
that has decimated crops in
South America for the past
few decades, is now emerg-
ing in South Asia.
Earlier this year, farmers
in eastern India and Bangla-
desh burned tens of thou-
sands of hectares of wheat
plantings after the crops be-
came infected.
The fungus has not yet
impacted crops here in the
U.S. But for those study-
ing the fungus, the question
is not if it will strike, but
when.
Funding shrinks
Scientists have yet to fig-
ure out how to breed wheat
varieties resistant to this
fungus, and they have yet
to figure out how to detect
the fungus before it shriv-
els the grain. As wheat blast
is spread by seeds and crop
residue, the only option left
is to burn the fields where
the fungus is suspected.
Everyone — farmers and
scientists alike — under-
stands that burning up live-
stock and farmland is not
a long-term solution to the
diseases afflicting agricul-
ture.
But for many problems,
long-term solutions have not
been found. What’s worse is
that the search for solutions
has ceased to be a priority
for our government.
In 1940, almost 40 per-
cent of the federal govern-
ment’s research budget was
devoted to the agricultural
sciences.
By the early 1970s, the
percentage was not even 6.5
percent. In 2014, it was 3.4
percent.
You can see the funding
issues quite clearly with the
Agriculture Department’s
flagship program for com-
petitively awarded grants,
the Agriculture and Food
Guest
comment
Thomas Grumbly
Research Initiative. AFRI
was created by Congress
almost 10 years ago and its
budget was authorized at
$700 million. In the midst
of talk about budget cuts and
limited spending, Congress
agreed to increase the pro-
gram’s scope by $25 million
— yet its current funding
still sits at only $375 mil-
lion.
Loss of imagination
With such limited fund-
ing, AFRI’s program admin-
istrators have tried to spread
its focus broadly, looking
to touch as many fields as
possible. Such a broad fo-
cus makes it hard for narrow
fields of research to earn
consistent funding.
Barbara Valent of Kansas
State University, for exam-
ple, is one of the leading re-
searchers on the blast fungus
in the world.
She has received two
AFRI grants that have
helped her understand how
rice varieties resist the dis-
ease, but she and others in
her field are still determining
the key to blast resistance in
wheat.
Even though her current
AFRI grant expires at the
end of 2017, she has been
unable to apply for another
grant since the program has
not focused recently on a
field of inquiry that includes
the blast fungus.
In many ways, the agri-
cultural sciences suffer from
a disease of lack of the pub-
lic imagination. People do
not generally dream of feed-
ing the world in the same
way that we dream of curing
cancer or putting an astro-
naut on Mars.
But even the most out-
rageous dreamer cannot
picture an end to world
hunger when farmers are
left with no other way to
stop mysterious pathogens
than by burning down their
farms.
It is time to put out these
fires and fight off diseases
with cold hard science. With
the federal budget season
upon us, funding agricultur-
al research has got to be a
priority for this year’s bud-
get as well as for the next
farm bill.
Our dreams for the fu-
ture — like our food supply
— have to stop going up in
smoke.
Thomas Grumbly is
president of Supporters
of Agricultural Research
Foundation. He has held
senior policy roles in the
Office of Management and
Budget, the Agriculture
Department and the Food
and Drug Administration.
This first appeared in the
American Farm Bureau’s
“Focus on Agriculture.”