10 CapitalPress.com
June 2, 2017
Jury rules with
Trump’s 2018 budget would cut
school
in
fight
Specialty Crop Block Grant Program
By SEAN ELLIS
Capital Press
President Donald’s Trump’s
proposed fiscal year 2018 bud-
get would eliminate funding for
USDA’s Specialty Crop Block
Grant Program.
A news release by the Spe-
cialty Crop Farm Bill Alliance
said the group is disappointed in
the proposal to eliminate funding
for that program and others that
are important to the specialty
crop industry.
The release said the proposals
seem “to indicate a fundamental
misunderstanding of what poli-
cies are needed to help specialty
crop providers create their own
success.”
“The benefits far outweigh
the costs of these programs,”
alliance representative Robert
Guenther told Capital Press.
Guenther pointed out that
the president’s budget is just a
“guidance document to Congress
on how the administration would
like to fund programs” and that
the alliance en-
joys wide support
among members
of Congress as
well as state de-
partments of agri-
culture.
“We’re con-
Andi Woolf-
fident we have
Weibye
enough support
for this program
to combat the administration’s
proposal,” he said. “We’re confi-
dent we’ll get the program fully
funded.”
The alliance is a national co-
alition of 120 organizations that
represent growers of specialty
crops, which include fruits, veg-
etables, dried fruit, tree nuts and
nursery plants.
Guenther said alliance mem-
bers will work with members of
the administration to help them
understand the value of the spe-
cialty crop block grant program.
Since 2008, USDA has pro-
vided $461 million in special-
ty crop block grant funding to
states, which have funded hun-
dreds of projects designed to
improve the competitiveness of
specialty crops.
USDA will provide $60 mil-
lion to states for their individual
specialty crop block grant pro-
grams during fiscal 2017.
The amount individual states
receive is based on a formula
that includes how much special-
ty crop acreage that state has and
the total farm cash receipts from
that sector.
Western states fare well when
it comes to the national rankings
for funding.
California ranks No. 1 and
will receive $19.2 million this
year, Washington ranks No. 2
with $4.1 million, Idaho is No. 6
with $1.76 million and Oregon is
No. 7 at $1.72 million.
The funding has been an
important way for many farm
groups, especially smaller ones,
to fund research and marketing
projects.
The Idaho Bean Commission,
for example, has been able to
fund numerous market expan-
sion and research projects with
the help of the specialty crop
block grant funding it has re-
ceived through the Idaho State
Department of Agriculture since
2009.
The commission has received
more than $100,000 in grants
during five of the past eight
years, while it’s overall budget is
close to $160,000.
“We couldn’t do anywhere
near the (number of) bean re-
search and market expansion
projects we do now without
that funding,” said IBC Admin-
istrator Andi Woolf-Weibye.
“It allows us to do projects we
otherwise wouldn’t be able to
do.”
The national program func-
tions in a way that allows each
state to decide how best to spend
the money to the benefit of its
specialty crop industries, Guen-
ther said.
For example, he said, a proj-
ect that helps Idaho potato grow-
ers “may not be what Washing-
ton state potato growers need.”
E. Idaho program gives urban students animal ag experience
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
POCATELLO, Idaho —
Jack Garrett advises an urban
FFA program at Highland High
School.
In the past, raising large live-
stock for 4-H projects wasn’t
feasible for most of his students,
aside from a few who made ar-
rangements with relatives on
working ranches.
This summer, however, bar-
riers to experiencing animal
agriculture will be removed for
Garrett’s students, thanks to a
new partnership involving the
high school, Bannock County
4-H and American Falls feedlot
owner Kerry Ward.
Garrett said at least 10 of his
students — mostly freshmen
and sophomores — intend to
participate in the county’s new,
collaborative bucket calf pro-
gram. Ward will lend 4-week-
old calves, which still require
being fed buckets of milk, for
the urban students to raise at the
Bannock County Fairgrounds
from June 12 through July 24.
The county will host a special
event for the students to show
their calves, before they’re
returned to Ward about 150
pounds heavier.
The county and Ward will
compensate the students for their
labor, given that they’ll miss out
on the chance to sell their calves
to local FFA supporters.
“I think we could probably
get more (participants) as we get
rolling on this project,” Garrett
said. “It doesn’t matter about the
money. They’re just excited for
the opportunity.”
Nikki Dalton, University of
Idaho Extension 4-H educator
for Bannock County, has also
opened the program to her 4-H
students. Ward has had a sim-
ilar arrangement for several
years with the Blackfoot area’s
urban students, based at the
Bingham County Fairgrounds.
He said students within the
John O’Connell/Capital Press
American Falls, Idaho, feedlot owner Kerry Ward discusses the bucket calf program he supports by lending
calves from his feedlot.
Shoshone-Bannock Indian Res-
ervation are also interested in
working with him to start a
program.
“I think it’s a wonderful idea
to expose families to the farm
lifestyle,” Ward said. “They
learn the ups and downs we all
go through to get food to the su-
permarket.”
In addition to his own cattle,
Ward custom feeds about 3,000
head for other feedlots that have
maxed out their space. He ad-
mits it’s a minor hassle turn over
calves to the students’ care, as
he often has to send staff mem-
bers to Blackfoot or Pocatello to
deliver feed. But he believes the
opportunity to enlighten chil-
dren who are becoming increas-
ingly removed from food pro-
duction is well worth the effort.
He said the students — who
must tend to their animals ear-
ly in the morning and late in the
evening — develop an appre-
ciation for hard work, and they
generally take exceptional care
of their calves. He recalls losing
a single calf in all of his years of
working with the program.
Dalton and Garrett will offer
participants weekly lectures on
animal nutrition, showmanship,
grooming, health, safety, ethics,
feeding and general care. Stu-
dents will be asked to maintain
a record book to document their
efforts. Payment rates have not
been set.
“Some (children) don’t have
the room to take care of large
animals, but they want to have
the experience of it, especially if
they’re interested in going into
animal science or a career like
that,” Dalton said.
over California
strawberries
By SCOTT SMITH
Associated Press
FRESNO, Calif. — A renowned strawberry
researcher in California broke patent law and vi-
olated a loyalty pledge to his former university by
taking his work with him to profit from it in a pri-
vate company, a jury in San Francisco has decided.
Professor Douglas Shaw formed his own re-
search firm with others after retiring from the
University of California-Davis, where for years
he had overseen the school’s strawberry breeding
program, developing a heartier and tastier fruit.
Jurors in the federal court decided that he used
seeds developed at UC-Davis without gaining the
university’s permission.
The rift struck fear in some farmers in Cali-
fornia, the No. 1 strawberry-growing state, that it
would stymie research and cause them to lose their
competitive edge. California last year produced
1.6 million tons of strawberries valued at rough-
ly $2 billion, according to the U.S. Department of
Agriculture.
The university’s strawberry breeding program
is now under new leadership, providing farmers
and consumers with new generations of the fruit,
school officials said.
“This federal jury decision is good news for
public strawberry breeders at UC-Davis and all
strawberry farmers throughout California and the
world,” said Helene Dillard, dean of the UC-Davis
College of Agriculture and Environmental Scienc-
es.
After reading the verdicts, Judge Vince Chhab-
ria, who oversaw the trial, scolded both sides, ex-
pressing doubt about the sincerity they claimed to
have for the strawberry industry.
“If you really care about strawberries, and if
you really cared about California’s Strawberry
Breeding Program, you would figure out a way...
to avoid subjecting them to this custody battle,” he
said.
Shaw had first sued UC-Davis after he retired,
saying that the university unfairly destroyed some
of his work and keeps some of his other research
locked in a freezer, depriving the world of a better
strawberry. He had sought $45 million for lost re-
search. The university countersued.
Shaw, 63, is a giant in the strawberry world,
heading the university’s breeding program for
more than two decades alongside plant biologist
Kirk Larson. Most of California’s strawberry farm-
ers grow plants developed by Shaw and Larson.
The two developed 24 new varieties, allow-
ing growers to double the amount of strawber-
ries produced while retaining the fruit’s succu-
lence. They created strawberries that were more
pest- and disease-resistant, more durable during
long-distance travel and capable of growing
during the shorter days of spring and fall.
The partners say their work netted the uni-
versity $100 million in royalties. How much
they themselves made at UC-Davis is unclear,
but they say they contributed more than $9 mil-
lion of their own royalties toward the universi-
ty’s breeding program.
They retired from the university in 2014 be-
cause, they said, the school was winding down
the program. Working in partnership with
growers and nurseries, they launched a busi-
ness called California Berry Cultivars, based
in Watsonville, to develop strawberry varieties.
Attorney Sharyl Reisman, who represents
the professors and California Berry Cultivars,
said that despite the disappointing verdict, her
clients wish to find a way to collaborate with the
university.
Damages the professors owe in the case will
be decided later, the judge said.
A.G. Kawamura, a strawberry farmer, for-
mer California agriculture secretary and part
owner of the California Berry Cultivars, said the
judge’s comments signal a need for much more
work to settle the dispute, even after the trial.
“We still believe there’s good reason to hope
for a collaborative progress for all parties to
move our strawberry industry forward without
litigation,” Kawamura said.
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