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March 30, 2018 CapitalPress.com Growers request an end to Strawberry Commission Wash. ag director to wait for audit Capital Press Capital Press Three major Washing- ton strawberry growers have asked state Agriculture Direc- tor Derek Sandison to disband the state’s strawberry com- mission, echoing a request the commission’s board made a year ago. Washington strawberry production has been declin- ing for decades, and so have assessments collected for re- search and grower interest in serving on the board. Commission directors said last spring the eight-member board had too many vacancies to function. In response, the state Department of Agricul- ture this year held a referen- dum on whether to terminate the commission. The depart- ment mailed ballots to 125 growers and got 13 back, not enough to validate the elec- tion. “I guess it kind of illus- trates the interest in the whole thing,” said the commission’s interim chairman, Richard Sakuma of Sakuma Brothers Farms in Skagit County. State law also allows Sandison to dissolve the commission if growers who produce at least one-fifth of the state’s crop request it. This month, the department received such a request from three Lynden operations, Clark’s Berry Farm, Curt Maberry Farm and Maberry Packing. The three met the 20 per- cent threshold. Sandison, however, will wait for a state audit of the commission’s fi- nances before making a deci- sion, a department spokesman said. The department expects the audit, the first on the com- mission since 2012, to be done soon, though it does not have an exact time frame, the spokesman said. The department oversees 22 agricultural commodity commissions and has been hoping that strawberry grow- ers will emerge who want to revitalize the commission. According to the 2012 Census of Agriculture, more than 600 Washington farms produced strawberries. The commis- Capital Press File Major Washington strawberry growers are asking the state Department of Agriculture to terminate the Washington Strawberry Commission. Straw- berry production statewide has declined over the past several decades. sion, however, said in a letter last year that there were few- er than 40 active strawberry growers, mostly small pro- ducers. Maberry Packing owner Jon Maberry said Tuesday that continuing the commis- sion may benefit fresh straw- berry growers, but most of the state’s strawberries are culti- vated for processing. Those growers don’t need to devel- op a new variety or promote fresh strawberries, he said. Farms already produce a vari- ety, Hood, favored by proces- sors, he said. “We’re an ingredient,” he said. “We’re not getting a lot out of (the commission) for the processing side.” Maberry said California has come to dominate the strawberry market. Plus, a la- bor shortage discourages new plantings of a crop that must be harvested by hand, he said. “We can’t get enough people to pick.” The commission is autho- rized to levy an assessment of one-half cent per pound. It didn’t collect assessments in 2017, anticipating its demise. The year before, the commis- sion collected $36,144. Sakuma said that he hasn’t given up on the idea of the commission reforming itself into an association for fresh strawberry growers. Such a group could promote locally grown berries and fund re- search into new varieties to appeal to consumers. A challenge would be rais- ing enough money, he said. The state produced 900,000 pounds of fresh strawberries in 2016, he said. Dried GMO apple ‘bits’ debut on Amazon.com By DAN WHEAT Capital Press SUMMERLAND, B.C. — Arctic ApBitz, french fry-re- sembling dried apple slices made from genetically mod- ified, non-browning apples, began selling on Amazon.com this week. It’s the latest product from Okanogan Specialty Fruits, of Summerland, B.C., which sold its first fresh-sliced, snack-pack Arctic apples last November. “We decided to make Arctic ApBitz dried apples available online via Ama- zon.com so that everyone in the U.S. would have access to our sweet and crunchable ApBitz snacks,” said Neal Carter, OSF founder and pres- ident. He said he’s often asked where Arctic apples can be bought and since young or- chards are still getting started the supply is limited. ApBitz sell for $19.99 for 12 snack- size bags. Just 40,000 to 50,000 pounds of fresh-sliced Arctic Goldens (Golden Delicious) sold in 70 stores under three retail banners across the Mid- west and in the Southeast in November. Some 120,000 to 130,000 pounds of the 2017 crop was held back for ApBitz this spring. Whole, bagged apples maybe test marketed next fall. The apples are genetically modified to prevent browning when sliced, bitten or bruised. It was done by “silencing” a gene to reduce the enzyme polyphenol oxidase. That al- lows OSF to tout its fresh and dried sliced apples as preser- Zinke grizzly decision draws criticism from NW ranchers By DAN WHEAT By DON JENKINS Okanogan Specialty Fruits Arctic ApBitz, dried apple slices that look like french fries, began selling on Amazon.com on March 26. They are made from non-browning genetically modified apples. vative-free. Other manufac- turers of fresh and dried sliced apples use chemical additives to prevent browning but it can alter flavor. Other than the Arctic brand being synonymous with ge- netically modified, there is no GMO labeling. Howev- er, the packaging has a link to the company website that explains the genetic modifi- cation. Carter said ApBitz were developed to avoid wasting apples that were not a suitable size for fresh slicing. In coming years, the com- pany will offer Arctic Granny Smith, Fuji and Gala. All but the Gala have been approved as safe in the U.S. and Cana- da. The Gala entered the ap- proval process more recently. The company will have 660 acres of orchards in Washington state by the end of 2018, growing to 1,450 acres by mid-2019 and in 2020 will plant an 1,000 acres in Washington and on the East Coast, Carter has said. 3 S E D R O - W O O L L E Y, Wash. — In an apparent turn- about, the Trump administra- tion is restarting a study of grizzly bear recovery in the North Cascades that was put on hold last December. “Restoring the grizzly bear to the North Cascades ecosystem is the American conservation ethic come to life,” Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke said March 23 at the North Cascades National Park Complex headquarters in Sedro Woolley. “We are managing the land and the wildlife accord- ing to the best science and best practices. The loss of the grizzly bear in the North Cas- cades would disturb the eco- system and rob the region of an icon,” Zinke said. “We are moving forward with plans to restore the bear to the North Cascades, continuing our commitment to conservation and living up to our responsi- bility as the premier stewards of our public land.” Zinke, who met with the region’s native American tribes the day before, empha- sized the cultural and spir- itual importance of grizzly bears in tribal communities, the contributions grizzly bears make to the biodiversi- ty of the ecosystem, and the ecological devastation that the permanent loss of grizzly bears would cause if nothing is done. Zinke’s statement delight- ed environmentalists and left ranchers and some other ru- ral residents disappointed, baffled, angry and feeling betrayed. In December, Conserva- tion Northwest, a regional Associated Press File Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has restarted a study of reintroduc- ing grizzly bears into the North Cascades of Washington state, causing ranchers and others to worry that the predators will hurt their livelihoods. conservation organization strongly supportive of griz- zly bear recovery, lament- ed media reports that North Cascades National Park Superintendent Karen Tay- lor-Goodrich said at a Dec. 13 Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee meeting in Mis- soula, Mont., that Zinke’s office had asked her staff to stop work on its environmen- tal impact statement for griz- zly bear recovery. On Friday, Conservation Northwest and Defenders of Wildlife issued statements thanking Zinke for support- ing recovery and restarting the EIS process. A final EIS will be issued in late summer. The National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will then choose a no-action al- ternative or one of several proactive alternatives. The proactive alternatives aim to restore a reproducing popula- tion of about 200 grizzlies by bringing them in from other areas. The agencies’ decision will be final and will not need Zinke’s approval, Taylor- Goodrich said. “The situation in Decem- ber was more a pause than a decision to stop,” Taylor- Goodrich said. “The new ad- ministration was taking stock of a lot of projects. We had a chance to go back and en- gage the secretary for him to truly understand the issues.” U.S. Rep. Dan Newhouse, R-Wash. and whose district encompasses part of the North Cascades, said he was disappointed Zinke didn’t talk to him first. “I reiterate that I hold the same position that I took after listening to my constituents. Local communities in Cen- tral Washington thought re- introducing grizzly bears was a bad idea when proposed by the previous administration, and it would be just as bad an idea if entertained by the current administration. The federal government should listen to and respect the local community,” Newhouse said. Sarah Ryan, executive vice president of the Wash- ington Cattlemen’s Associa- tion, said the idea of “dump- ing man-eating grizzly bears from helicopters into Wash- ington national parks has not been well thought out.” Once grizzlies walk out of the park into rural towns and private and state lands, peo- ple will be greatly impacted, Ryan said. “Already the livestock community has had little to no help with the management and recovery of wolves in the North Cascades, and cannot accept and welcome another federally listed apex predator with no monetary help from the federal government,” she said. Ethan Lane, executive director of the Public Lands Council and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Associa- tion Federal Lands organi- zation, said those groups are extremely disappointed. He said Zinke has talked about being a better neighbor, but that reintroducing as many as 200 man-eating predators into an area “reeling from an exploding gray wolf popu- lation is anything but neigh- borly.” The Oregon Cattlemen’s Association also issued a statement opposing Zinke’s action, citing increased pub- lic safety risk in a region al- ready struggling with wolves. Okanogan County Com- missioner Jim DeTro said he was “shocked and baffled.” “I don’t know why the hell they are restarting the process. Even downtown Seattle doesn’t want them,” DeTro said. No economic study was done, a habitat study is fa- tally flawed and many rural residents believed the ad- ministration had stopped the project, he said. Defunct Oregon beef processor expects to cover debts By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Capital Press EUGENE, Ore. — An Or- egon beef processor has shut down while owing $4.6 mil- lion to cattle suppliers, but the company says in court fil- ings that it expects its assets are worth more than its debts. A court-appointed re- ceiver will oversee the dis- solution of Bartels Packing, which in mid-March closed its slaughterhouse and pro- cessing facilities near Eu- gene, Ore. Apart from the immedi- ate financial impacts to sup- pliers, the demise of Bartels Packing also signifies the loss of a major cattle buyer in Oregon’s livestock industry. “We look for competi- tion in the marketplace, so there’s one less competitor in the marketplace now,” said Bruce Anderson, owner of the Eugene Livestock Auc- tion. Representatives of Bar- tels Packing would regu- larly attend Oregon several livestock auctions, where they’d primarily bid on culled dairy cattle and other “butcher cows” that would be processed into hamburger, Mateusz Perkowski/Capital Press File Chris and Kandi Bartels, who own defunct beef processor Bartels Packing near Eugene, Ore., have closed the business but expect to have enough assets to repay debts, including $4.6 million owed to cattle suppliers. Anderson said. Bartels Packing was among the three largest bid- ders for cattle at the Wood- burn Livestock Exchange, said Tom Elder, the auction yard’s owner. The other two companies, Walt’s Wholesale Meats and Schenk Packing, operate out of Washington state. Specifically, Bartels Pack- ing had a demand for organic dairy cows, which provide much-needed supplementary income for dairy farmers, he said. “There’s already plenty of cows to keep these packers busy,” Elder said. Less competition for cat- tle typically means lower prices. When Bartels occasional- ly didn’t attend the auction, prices were about 10 percent lower for cattle the company would normally bid on, he said. However, broader fluctua- tions in the beef market may compensate for the closure of Bartels Packing, and another competitor may eventually fill its niche, Elder said. “There’s definitely an op- portunity there for someone,” he said. Oregon already has limit- ed beef processing facilities, so the absence of Bartels Packing will be felt in the industry, said Jerome Rosa, executive director of the Ore- gon Cattlemen’s Association. “It’s definitely going to have an impact on beef prices here in the Northwest,” Rosa said. “This is a real sad situ- ation to lose a packer of that size in Oregon.” With the demand for U.S. beef in China, though, anoth- er business could potentially buy Bartels’ equipment and replace the lost slaughter and processing facilities, either at the same location or a differ- ent one, Rosa said. The company’s owner, Chris Bartels, did not re- spond to a request for com- ment. In court documents seek- ing to dissolve the company, Bartels requested that a re- ceiver oversee the liquidation of assets to maximize their value. The company’s assets are worth between $13.5 mil- lion and $14 million, includ- ing $8 million in inventory, $300,000 in accounts receiv- able and more than $5.5 million in fixed assets, such as equipment, according to court filings. Weekly fieldwork report Calif. Ore. Wash. Idaho • Snow water equivalent* 69.7% 111.8% 97.1% 76.2% • Percent area in drought 76.1% 11.7% 44.3% 88.9% 33-50% above 33% below/ 33% above 33% below/ 50% above 50-60% above 40% above/ Normal 40% above 40% above/ Normal Normal/ 40% below Normal/ Below normal Above normal/ Normal Above normal/ Normal Below normal Item/description • Avg. temperature, 6-10 day outlook (Percent chance deviation from normal) • Precipitation, 6-10 day outlook (Percent chance deviation from normal) • Soil moisture anomaly (Monthly deviation from normal) *Aggregate average percent of median as of March 20. Medians calculated for the period from 1981-2010. Sources: USDA, NRCS; NOAA, www.ca.gov/; www.drought.gov/