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8 CapitalPress.com Friday, August 30, 2019 State tax commission: Farmer input should drive assessments By BRAD CARLSON Capital Press Agricultural land should be assessed based on farmer-supplied data rather than a county-wide aver- age, the Idaho State Tax Commis- sion says in a proposed administra- tive rule change. The change will potentially pro- vide relief to farmers who grow low- er-value crops. The change, which the 2020 Leg- islature must approve, says local farmers’ reports will determine agri- cultural assessments. If that infor- mation is insufficient, data from third-party providers like USDA or the University of Idaho may be used. “There were folks in agriculture who were concerned that the rules as they exist were not clear enough to provide guidance to assessors to require them to use local data when it’s available,” Idaho Farm Bureau Federation Governmen- tal Affairs Director Russ Hendricks said. “There were instances in the past where local data was available and specific assessors chose to use just statewide averages, which made values higher than they otherwise would be.” Ray Moore, whose Filer-area farm did not include one of the region’s popular high-value crops, petitioned the commission’s Prop- erty Tax Rules Committee to open relevant rules for possible revision. He said net operating income, a key factor in valuation, should reflect which crops are grown. “He wanted a little more empha- sis within the rule to encourage the use of local farmers’ data when cal- culating the assessed value for agri- cultural land,” commission Property Tax Policy Specialist Kathlynn Ire- land said. In the proposed rule change, “that By BRAD CARLSON Capital Press Brad Carlson/Capital Press George Brown and Kathlynn Ireland at the Idaho State Tax Commission office in Boise. subsection specifically states local farmer data is the principal informa- tion we seek,” she said. In specifying by rule that local information deter- mines assessed values, the commis- sion aims to “encourage farmers to share their local data, which would result in a more representative, fair and equitable assessment.” State law requires an income- based approach for assessing agri- cultural land so the property’s actual use, rather than its speculative value, is reflected. Tax Commission Property Tax Division Administrator George Brown said that while this gener- ally produces lower values than comparable-sales or building-cost approaches, it works best when landowners are forthcoming. Assessors send surveys to agri- cultural producers, some of whom do not complete them in full, he said. “But a lot of times, just the tax- payer being involved increases the accuracy of the assessment,” Brown said. Data shared does not become public at the individual farm level. Ireland said farmers are encour- aged to share information that will figure into net operating income. Crops grown, cultivation expenses, and rotations over the trailing five years are examples. If the landowner is leasing to another farmer, “we would take the lease rate the land- lord is receiving and capitalize that into an assessed value per acre.” Brown said that in instances where averages were previously used, they were often countywide. But expenses can vary widely for individual ag properties within a county, he said, based on factors like irrigation and well availability, and elevation differences. USDA clears gene-edited, virus-resistant tomatoes Six tomato lines rely on native genes, natural plant defense mechanism By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Capital Press Gene-edited tomatoes that are resistant to common viruses can be introduced into the U.S. without coming under federal regulations for genetically engineered plants. The USDA has determined that six tomato lines developed by Nex- gen Plants of Australia aren’t poten- tial plant pests and thus don’t fall under the agency’s jurisdiction for regulating biotech crops. Nexgen altered the tomatoes with “particle bombardment” of gene sequences that allows the plants to detect and destroy the tomato spotted wilt virus and cau- liflower mosaic virus. “We only use the native DNA of the plant, we don’t insert any for- eign DNA,” said Philippe Herve, the company’s CEO. Tomatoes and other plants natu- rally rely on molecules of ribonu- cleic acid, or RNA, to recognize and chop up invading sequences of virus DNA, but the pathogen evolves to circumvent this mechanism. “The plants need time to develop another defense if the virus mutates,” Herve said. “It’s kind of an endless battle between the virus Cory Kress appointed to Idaho Wheat Commission Capital Press File Nexgen Plants has received approval from USDA to conduct field trials of six gene-edited, virus-resistant tomato lines. and the plant.” Instead of waiting for the process to occur naturally, Nexgen assem- bles components of existing tomato DNA to target the newest strains of the virus, accelerating the develop- ment of resistance, he said. Particles of gold coated with this reconfigured tomato DNA were repeatedly blasted into the plant’s cells. The six virus-resistant lines were created when tomato plants naturally integrated Nexgen’s tem- plate into their genes to fight off the viruses. Traditionally, farmers have warded off virus infections by tar- geting the insects that spread the diseases. Now, however, they are using fewer insecticides, decreasing the likelihood of virus transmission, Herve said. Nexgen is simply providing the tomato plants with an up-to- date version of the DNA template needed to fight the virus without interfering with the defense mech- anism itself, he said. Such changes to plant DNA can be accomplished with the use of agrobacterium, which is considered a plant pest, but that would place the tomato lines under USDA reg- ulations for genetic engineering, Herve said. By relying on particle bombard- ment and native DNA, the com- pany can now conduct field trials within the U.S. without undergoing the federal deregulation process, he said. However, Nexgen is a research company rather than a plant breeder, and so would need to find a company with that expertise to commercialize the virus-resistant traits, Herve said. “We need to find a partner to bring this technology to market.” The Center for Food Safety, a nonprofit that advocates stricter federal oversight of biotechnol- ogy, believes the type of gene-ed- iting performed by Nexgen should be regulated by the USDA, said Bill Freese, the group’s science policy analyst. “The small interfering RNAs that are generated in these tomatoes may well have off-target effects — meaning that they may silence genes other than those which are targeted to achieve virus resistance, with unpredictable effects on plant physi- ology,” Freese said in an email. Gov. Brad Little has appointed Rock- land-area farmer Cory Kress to a five-year term on the Idaho Wheat Commission. He replaces Soda Springs farmer Jerry Brown, who retired after serving 10 years. “I was honored, and I appreciate the oppor- t u n i t y, ” K r e s s Cory Kress said. “I have a lot of respect for the commissioners and what they have done in the past. I am passion- ate about both wheat and agriculture, and I have a strong convic- tion that farmers can help each other if we work as a group and exchange thoughts, ideas and resources among us all. “Commissions are a great way to do that,” he said, “where we can pool grower dollars and figure out how to benefit grow- ers all over the state with those funds.” The state’s roughly 3,000 wheat growers pay a checkoff of 3.5 cents per bushel at the first point of sale to fund research, marketing and education. “Obviously, I’m new, so I’m just trying to get up to speed with every- thing that’s going on,” Kress said. Like the other wheat commissioners, he is interested in agronomic research and trade, and in further developing domestic and foreign markets as well as uses for Idaho grain, he said. He supports maintaining the port navigation chan- nel in the Lower Snake River, for years the sub- ject of debate over pos- sibly removing four dams. “I represent all the different growers in Dis- trict 5 and want to make everyone aware that I am available for any concerns, thoughts or ideas they might have,” Kress said. “It’s import- ant to me to remember whose money it is we are allocating.” He grows soft white and hard white wheat, mostly planted in fall. His dryland farm also pro- duces safflower, mustard seed, peas and chickpeas. Kress also serves on the Idaho Oilseed Com- mission. His second three-year term expires June 30. His wife, Jamie Kress, is on the Idaho Grain Pro- ducers Association Exec- utive Board. Lawsuit faults Conagra for sloppy Pinnacle acquisition By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Capital Press 33-4-1/106 A shareholder law- suit claims corporate lead- ers at the Conagra Brands food company acted negli- gently and unjustly enriched themselves with the $11 billion purchase of a rival manufacturer. The complaint accuses Conagra of touting the 2018 acquisition of Pinna- cle Foods as a “no brainer” without performing suffi- cient due diligence, caus- ing its stock price to plunge when Pinnacle’s poor per- formance was eventually revealed. Shortly before the merger, Conagra’s CEO, Sean Con- nolly, described Pinnacle as a “juggernaut” and “terrific business” whose brands — including Birds Eye frozen products — will serve as a complementary “bolt-on” to its own product lines. A few months later, how- ever, after the purchase had closed, Connolly admitted there was “deterioration” in Pinnacle’s performance, with its sales coming in “below expectations” due to “subpar innovation and exe- cutional missteps,” the com- plaint said. Wall Street analysts crit- icized Conagra’s leader- ship for being unaware of “warning flares” and con- ducting “lax due diligence” of the deal, since the prob- lems described at Pinna- cle appeared to be deeper than just a short-term sales decline cause by compet- itive pressure, the lawsuit said. In the final weeks of December 2018, Conagra’s price per share dropped nearly 28%, from about $29 to $21, the complaint said. The company’s share price has since recovered to about $28. Aside from Connolly, Conagra’s CEO, the lawsuit also names the company’s chief financial officer, cor- porate controller and eight members of its board of directors as defendants. The lawsuit accuses them of breaching their fiduciary duties by “will- fully or recklessly” fail- ing to disclose the prob- lems faced by Pinnacle, violating securities law and unjustly enriching them- selves through “lucrative insider sales” or through “bonuses, stock options or similar compensation.” The complaint seeks damages in an amount to be determined during liti- gation, as well as corporate reforms at Conagra to pre- vent “a repeat of the damag- ing events.” A representative of Conagra said the company has no comment about the allegations.
