12 CapitalPress.com
February 9, 2018
Scope of (Clean Water Act) jurisdiction
is an issue of ‘national importance’
High-pressure ridges persisting off the West
Coast will be ‘disastrous’ for California
WOTUS from Page 1
“It’s worth noting that these
lawsuits are over an embat-
tled legislation that’s been
put on hold by the courts to
prevent it from taking effect.
Our delay rule will keep in
place that status quo,” an
EPA spokeswoman said in an
email.
The rule sets the reach
of the Clean Water Act. The
American Farm Bureau Fed-
eration in earlier statements
warned that the 2015 rule
would expand the act’s ju-
risdiction to ditches and low
spots that are only occasion-
ally wet and would expose
WEATHER from Page 1
farmers to citizen lawsuits for
activities as routine as plow-
ing a field.
States have been suing to
overturn or uphold the 2015
rule. In an announcement Feb.
1 in the Federal Register, the
EPA and Corps said the two-
year suspension heads off the
possibility that conflicting
federal court decisions will
cause the rule to vary between
states.
“The scope of (Clean Wa-
ter Act) jurisdiction is an issue
of national importance and
therefore the agencies will en-
deavor to provide for robust
deliberations and public en-
gagement as they re-evaluate
the definitions of ‘waters of
the United States,’” according
to the notice.
Ferguson has sued the
Trump administration 21
times. Washington Gov. Jay
Inslee, a fellow Democrat,
said the latest suit seeks to
protect “our economy and our
quality of life.”
“This (Trump) administra-
tion’s continual efforts to roll
back crucial protections for
our nation’s beautiful spac-
es and the health and safety
of all Americans will not go
unchecked,” Inslee said in a
statement.
Winter wheat conditions
are near-normal in Eastern
Washington.
Douglas also said he’s
heard winter wheat condi-
tions in the Southern Plains
are the worst they’ve been in
10 years.
Model forecasts vary, in-
dicating La Niña could last
through October, continu-
ing drought conditions in
the southwestern U.S. and
Southern Plains, or possibly
end earlier.
In the spring, a high pres-
sure ridge will keep the West
warm and dry. Northwest
flow into the plains will push
moisture to the east, keeping
winter wheat conditions there
poor, Douglas said.
In the summer, warm and
dry conditions will continue
to impact the West, Douglas
said.
Expanding drought is ev-
ident in California and the
Southwest, Douglas said,
adding that spring high-pres-
sure ridges persisting off the
West Coast will be “disas-
trous” for California.
“They had some good
moisture there in November,”
he said. “It started turning dry
in December, they had a very
dry January. ... It looks like
they’re going to have virtual-
ly no precipitation in Febru-
ary, and now you look at this
forecast, complete blocking
of all storms getting into Cal-
ifornia.”
Douglas said 2018 is most
likely to resemble 2001,
1956, 1951, 1994 and 2014.
Oregon will be a little dri-
er than Washington, Douglas
said.
“The last good wet month
is really March, and from
then on out you’re flirting
with dryness,” Douglas told
growers.
U.S. Wheat Associates
Bakery consultant Roy Chung demonstrates baking techniques in 1982 at a U.S. Wheat Associates baking seminar in Indonesia.
Chung has worked for U.S. Wheat for more than 40 years
WHEAT from Page 1
Industry leaders light up
when they talk about Chung.
“It’s in his soul,” said Mike
Miller, the U.S. Wheat chair-
man, a member of the Wash-
ington Grain Commission
board and a Ritzville, Wash.,
farmer. “This is who he is.
He doesn’t do it for any other
country. He’s trying to do it so
we can sell more wheat at a
better price.”
Chung’s “unparalleled”
knowledge of wheat starch
properties and how they per-
form in a food product leads
people to seek out his exper-
tise. He helps companies de-
sign production lines and new
products, said Dana Herron,
a Connell, Wash., seed dealer
and grain commission board
member.
“We would be 20 years be-
hind in marketing and sales if
there’s no Roy Chung,” Her-
ron said.
Getting his start
Kah Hee “Roy” Chung,
63, has worked for U.S.
Wheat for more than 40 years.
Before that, he assisted in
his father’s bakery in Malay-
sia. Chung was home during
college vacation and helping
his father, who immigrat-
ed from China to Malaysia
during World War II, when
a consultant from Western
Wheat Associates asked to
use the bakery for a prod-
uct demonstration. Western
Wheat later merged with
Great Plains Wheat to form
U.S. Wheat Associates.
“My father was generous
in allowing his competitors
into the bakery to observe
the demonstration as well,”
Chung said.
Chung’s father did not
speak English and the con-
sultant was working alone, so
Chung served as his assistant
and interpreter for the event.
Months later, he received an
“We would be 20 years behind in marketing
and sales if there’s no Roy Chung.”
Dana Herron, Connell, Wash., seed dealer and grain commission board member.
offer to join Western Wheat,
but declined, as he was not
yet finished with school. He
was studying production en-
gineering at the Ungku Omar
Polytechnic in Malaysia.
Western Wheat waited two
years for Chung to complete
his education, and he was in-
terviewed by Tom Mick, who
would later become CEO of
the Washington Grain Com-
mission. Mick hired him to
join WWA.
“He has a unique ability
to teach people how to make
a superior end-product and
at the same time reduce costs
that would make it profit-
able,” said Mick, who is now
retired.
Mick said Chung could
“pull miracles,” convincing
reluctant bakers to change
wheat or flour sources.
“I think (Chung is) one of
the greatest hires I’ve ever
been involved with,” Mick
said. “To the wheat producer,
he is a godsend.”
Selling U.S. wheat
If a buyer is new to U.S.
wheat, Chung goes back to
basics. He explains the dif-
ference in U.S. wheat classes,
their uses and the suitability
of different classes for the
products they make in each
country.
He likens this to teaching
them the ABCs before turning
the letters into words, then the
words into sentences.
“For the more experienced
buyers, it gets even more ex-
citing if you can string sen-
tences to make paragraphs,”
Chung said. “And then para-
graphs to make a chapter and
eventually chapters into an
entire book.”
U.S. Wheat employees,
he said, show a company the
possibilities they can get from
the wheat American farmers
produce.
“We will provide exam-
ples of how others are making
money from the wheat that
they buy from the U.S.,” he
said.
Chung says he is always
sincere in his approach and
communication.
“Don’t bring the buffalo to
the river to make it drink if the
buffalo is not thirsty,” he said.
If a buyer is similarly sin-
cere, U.S. Wheat will hold his
or her hand all the way and
show them how to extract val-
ue in any market, Chung said.
“He’s made those compa-
nies so much money using
Pacific Northwest soft white
wheat, he is highly respect-
ed,” Herron said. “People lis-
ten to his every word, because
he has their best interest at
heart.”
Teaching bakers
U.S. Wheat cooperates
with United Flour Mills in
Thailand to offer specialized
baking courses at the mill’s
baking and cooking school
in Bangkok. Chung was in-
strumental in offering the first
course. The program has con-
tinued for 38 years.
“U.S. Wheat finds value
in educating young bakers
to see and feel the differ-
ences in quality when com-
pared to wheats of other
origins,” Chung said. “The
lasting impression we im-
part to these bakers (stays)
for their entire lives.”
Many bakers trained at the
school move on to the upper
ranks of their organizations,
helping their company expand
and securing a stable supply
of U.S. wheat.
“I like to say that I im-
part knowledge that will en-
able my students to make
good judgment,” Chung said.
“More importantly, I leave
them to pursue their careers in
a more passionate way know-
ing that I, as a representative
of U.S. Wheat, will always be
there for them. I am sincere
when I make this offer.”
As a result of working with
Chung, when mills go to grain
purchasers with their specifi-
cations for U.S. wheat, they
know what they want and
how to ask for it, Miller said.
“He’s actually helped raise
them in the wheat world,”
Miller said. “He can go into
their mill, they know exactly
what he’s talking about.”
And they listen.
“When they hear Roy’s in
the house, it’s like Paul McCa-
rtney just showed up,” Miller
said. “They flock to him. He
engages them, he remembers
their names, asks them how
they’re doing, ‘Have you ad-
dressed this problem?’ or they
ask him, ‘Hey, we have this.’
They trust him. He’s no-non-
sense. He stands behind his
work.”
An ‘encyclopedia’
Chung worked close-
ly with Vietnamese flour
millers and bakeries to help
them understand the uses of
U.S. wheat, said Dinh Xuan
Quang, technical manager of
Vietnam Flour Mills. It took a
long time because U.S. pric-
es were higher than those of
competing countries.
“Now, in Vietnam, the
cookies and cake industry
can’t live without soft white
wheat,” Quang said.
Wilma Bocaya, vice presi-
dent of Jollibee Foods Corp.,
a fast food bun manufacturing
company in the Philippines,
attended Chung’s course in
1994, after a colleague at-
tended the year before. Her
company sends students ev-
ery year.
“When we met Roy in
1993, we only had 105 Jol-
libee stores,” Bocaya said.
“This number has now grown
into more than a thousand in
the Philippines.”
The company is expanding
its baking operation this year
to support further growth.
“Suffice it to say that the
technical support we got from
U.S. Wheat through Roy as
consultant or as course in-
structor enabled us to provide
products that meet our cus-
tomers’ expectations,” Bo-
caya said.
Wantana
Thongthai,
president of United Flour
Mills Food Center Co. Ltd.,
and operator of the baking
school, has known Chung
since 1988. The compa-
ny feels strongly that U.S.
wheat quality best matches
its needs, she said.
“Through my tenure at
UFM, I have not met a con-
sultant more knowledgeable
in his trade than Mr. Chung,”
she said. “He is known among
us as ‘the walking baking en-
cyclopedia.’”
Changing times
With the internet, many
customers are more knowl-
edgeable and demanding,
Chung said. Few countries
produce generic flour for
breads, cakes and cookies, and
most bakeries use specialized
flour for specific products.
“We must justify these
sales with scientific facts and
examples of how this basic
information has been used
to produce more specialized
flours for specialized prod-
ucts,” Chung said.
U.S. Wheat must keep
re-educating itself technically
to sell wheat at an advantage,
Chung said.
“If we fail to do that, we
will be just another generic
seller, and worse still, a resid-
ual seller,” he said.
Chung said it’s not cur-
rently possible to retire, since
there are few people with his
technical expertise in the in-
dustry. He’d like to leave his
customers in good hands, he
said.
He hopes to leave the U.S.
Wheat office with a younger
team of technical staffers who
would work “as passionately
and sincerely with our cus-
tomers as I have.”
If U.S. Wheat hired some-
one he could begin to train
this year, he said, he could see
retiring in five years.
Miller, the U.S. Wheat
chairman, knows at some
point Chung will want to slow
down.
“I don’t know if you can
replace that type of historical
knowledge and energy with
one person,” he said. “I bet
you’d have to do it with two.”
That could be a good thing
for wheat farmers, Herron be-
lieves.
“If we had a couple more
Roy Chungs, we wouldn’t
have to worry about compe-
tition overseas,” he said. “He
makes that big of a differ-
ence.”