Friday, June 25, 2021
CapitalPress.com 7
Q&A: Crystal Potter, incoming board chair of Idaho’s wine commission
By BRAD CARLSON
Capital Press
Crystal Potter is slated to take
over as Idaho Wine Commission
board chair on July 1. A board
member since 2017, she succeeds
Earl Sullivan.
Potter co-owns Potter Wines
in Garden City with her husband,
Von Potter. The Idaho wine indus-
try includes 69 wineries and about
1,300 planted acres.
Capital Press recently inter-
viewed her about the state’s grow-
ing wine industry.
Capital Press: What is the board
working on for the rest of 2021 and
into 2022? What market trends or
other needs are driving that work?
Crystal Potter: As we rebound
from the pandemic and the loss
of events, the board has shifted
the commission’s focus a bit. We
are focusing on education, both
within the industry as well as con-
sumer-driven. The wine industry
in Idaho has gained tremendous
Kimberly Teske Fetrow
Crystal Potter of Potter Wines,
Garden City, Idaho.
momentum in recent years, and
with that there is a demand for fur-
thering education among the wine-
makers and grape growers.
The quality of vineyards and
wines in this state is attracting
national attention. We have some
really fantastic wines here, which
I believe lends itself to the com-
mitment our wineries and grow-
ers have to consistently raise the
bar in what they do. People are lov-
ing Idaho wines and really talking
about them in their communities.
So we’re seeing a demand for more
education on that level, too.
CP: What are a couple of chal-
lenges the board faces as it works
to help grow the industry in the
state while continuing to serve
existing
participants?
How
is the board addressing these
challenges?
Potter: The most obvious but
certainly most signifi cant chal-
lenge has been the pandemic and
the loss in the commission’s bud-
get this past fi scal year. We lost
$200,000 and we were not eligible
for COVID relief funds because
we are a state agency. We had to
cancel a great deal of events and
lay off a staff member. Looking
forward, we are going to ask the
Legislature for one-time funds to
help us get back on our feet and
keep the growing industry mov-
ing forward. We are trying to be
inventive with the little funding
we do have.
CP: On the consumer-facing
side, how are Idaho winery oper-
ators and other retail participants
positioned coming out of the
COVID-19 pandemic?
Potter: We are all so thrilled to
be fully open again and welcom-
ing consumers back to our tasting
rooms. In the past few months, we
have seen a fantastic showing and
incredible support of the indus-
try as people get back out and
try new wines and visit the tast-
ing rooms. We’re grateful for get-
ting through 2020 and it certainly
would not have been possible
without our communities sup-
porting us. We’re looking ahead
with gratitude for our consumers
and dedicating our eff orts to pro-
duce high-quality wines.
CP: On the agriculture side,
what trends are you seeing among
vineyard operators and proces-
sors? How is the board involved?
Potter: We’re seeing the
growers more dedicated than ever
to the quality of the vineyards.
From irrigation practices to bio-
diversity and soil health, they are
committed to the development
of ongoing processes that aff ect
the quality of the grapes from the
vine to the glass. Part of our mis-
sion is to be able to consistently
give growers the resources they
need to make every acre planted
count.
CP: What is the board’s out-
look for the Idaho wine industry
as the pandemic winds down and
in-migration to Idaho from other
states continues?
Potter: We don’t see the
growth of this industry slow-
ing down anytime soon, thank-
fully. We’re excited to resume our
annual Savor Idaho event in June
2022. Besides that, our strategic
priorities are to build on consumer
awareness, gain sustainable fund-
ing and continue to off er education
and resources industrywide.
Weather, feed costs to keep global milk supply in check
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
Idaho Department of Lands
Idaho’s land board auctioned two parcels of land for
nearly $36 million.
State auctions ag parcels in
growing SW Idaho for $35.2M
By BRAD CARLSON
Capital Press
An auction of state-
owned farmland in the grow-
ing Caldwell, Idaho, area
generated nearly six times its
appraised value.
Idaho Department of
Lands offi cials said two adja-
cent parcels totaling 282
acres sold at a June 11 auc-
tion for $35.2 million.
Their
combined
appraised value was about
$6 million.
The University of Idaho
has leased the parcels for
agricultural research since
the 1940s. The university
about two years ago sold an
adjacent veterinary training
facility.
UI said earlier that it
plans to request the state
Board of Land Commission-
ers reinvest the auction pro-
ceeds in land at its agricul-
tural research centers.
It has nine research and
extension centers and six
affi liated centers.
The affi liated centers
include the Idaho Center
for Agriculture, Food and
the Environment (CAFE),
a 640-acre dairy and nutri-
ent research facility under
development
north
of
Rupert.
Planned
addi-
tional phases are an educa-
tion and outreach complex
near Jerome and a food-pro-
cessing pilot plant in coop-
eration with the College
of Southern Idaho in Twin
Falls. The combined cost is
estimated at $45 million, UI
development director Jim
Miller said.
Scott Phillips, Idaho
Department of Lands pol-
icy and communications
JEWETT
chief, said that after trans-
action closing and property
disposition, proceeds will
be deposited into the stat-
ute-authorized land bank.
He said the land board
could opt to use proceeds
to acquire new property on
behalf of the benefi ciary,
leave that money in the land
bank for up to fi ve years
while it explores other rein-
vestment opportunities or
transfer the funds into the
permanent fund.
The state’s endowment
consists of land and the per-
manent fund. The fund’s
investments generate inter-
est distributed to benefi cia-
ries annually.
Phillips said June 15 that
the land board does not cur-
rently have a meeting sched-
uled to discuss the Caldwell
sale.
“We do expect the Uni-
versity of Idaho to make a
request for reinvestment,” he
said. The board at that point
would meet and consider it.
“This auction was incred-
ibly valuable because the
land was no longer support-
ing the university’s research
facility and the revenue gen-
erated from the farm lease
on the land was nominal,”
Idaho Department of Lands
Real Estate Services Bureau
chief Josh Purkiss said in a
release. “It was the right time
to sell this land in the best
interest of the endowment
benefi ciaries.”
The department said the
winning bidder among 12
was Endurance Holdings
LLC. An Idaho Secretary of
State’s Offi ce business entity
fi ling lists Endurance at the
same Meridian address as
CBH Homes.
Margins for dairy farm-
ers in the Big 7 exporting
regions are at breakeven or
better, supporting milk sup-
ply growth, but weather and
feed costs are likely to limit
global production growth,
according to Rabobank
analysts.
Rabobank is expecting
modest year-on-year pro-
duction growth of just 1%
during the next 12 months,
the analysts said in their
latest “Dairy Quarterly”
report.
Nonetheless, they are
forecasting expansion in
combined exportable sur-
plus in 2021 — with the
U.S. doing most of the
heavy lifting.
The top dairy export-
ers are the U.S., EU, New
Zealand, Australia, Brazil,
Argentina and Uruguay.
The U.S. dairy cow count
in April was 9.49 million,
the largest in more than 20
years and more than 135,000
head higher than the low of
the pandemic in June 2020.
Most of the additional cows
are in Texas and the Upper
Midwest.
“This represents a con-
tinuing movement from the
coasts inward searching for
fewer barriers to scale and
the prospect of new pro-
cessing capacity,” the ana-
lysts said.
U.S. milk production in
April increased 3.3% year
over year and was up 4.7%
from April 2019. High feed
costs, however, will chal-
lenge the pace of growth
and lower producing cows
are likely to be culled.
“Dairies that grow their
own feedstuff s and those
that purchased feed before
U.S. MILK PRICE
FORECAST
Dollars per
hundredweight
CLASS III
Q2 2021 — 18.14
Q3 2021 — 18.26
Q4 2021 — 18.28
Q1 2022 — 16.26
Q2 2022 — 16.76
Q3 2022 — 17.24
CLASS IV
Q2 2021 — 16.09
Q3 2021 — 16.78
Q4 2021 — 17.00
Q1 2022 — 16.57
Q2 2022 — 16.73
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press File
International dairy production will increase in the
next 12 months, analysts say.
the spike in prices are far-
ing better than those buy-
ing spot feed,” the analysts
said.
Herd expansions are also
limited by higher construc-
tion costs, they said.
But the sizable and effi -
cient milk-cow herd will
carry momentum through
the rest of the year for a
2.2% increase year over
year in the second half of
2021. The analysts expect
growth to slow to a 1.1%
gain in the fi rst half of 2022.
U.S. domestic demand is
forecast to increase by 4.4%
year over year in the second
quarter of 2021 as reopen-
ing from the pandemic
accelerates. The second half
of the year should continue
to show improvement over
2020, up 2% year over year.
“The fi rst half of 2022
will give a mixed picture
but will be net positive,
up 0.6% year on year,” the
analysts said.
On the broader stage,
global dairy markets are
delicately poised waiting
for some direction. Further
upside cannot be ruled out,
but the peak is near, they
said.
“An expected softening
of Chinese import demand
should be enough to trig-
ger a price correction in the
dairy complex that is likely
to occur in the later stages of
2021,” they said.
China’s demand for
hog feed will grow, but
that’s really only relevant
to whey, said Ben Laine, a
Rabobank economist.
“That’s positive for U.S.
Q3 2022 — 16.91
Source: Rabobank
exports since whey is the
primary dairy product we
sell to China, and we’re
already seeing that in the
strength of the whey mar-
ket,” he said.
More broadly across
other dairy commodi-
ties like whole milk pow-
der is where there might
be a cooling off in Chi-
na’s import needs. That’s
more of an issue for New
Zealand, where trade with
China is dominated by
whole milk powder, he said.
“China has been work-
ing on growing their own
milk production recently
and while they will never
be fully self-suffi cient, it
will start to slow down the
growth rate of their import
needs at some point,” he
said.
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