11/27/2007 According to the Monterey County Weekly, produce handlers are forcing local growers to change or eliminate their conservation practices. The reasons: law suits, depressed sales and a lack of consumer confidence in the industry. Vegetable buyers are demanding farmers strip vegetation from their ditches, uproot grasses, remove ponds, erect tall fences, and use more rodenticides. Even though researchers have not determined how E. coli O157:H7 and Salmonella get into fields or on produce. Bob Perkins, Monterey County Farm Bureau Executive Director, says this creates a double-edged sword. If you don't take steps to remove animals from the fields, than you risk buyers rejecting your crop. If you fortify your fields by removing buffers and riparian habitat, than you invite strong criticism from resource conservation agencies. "Because of the E. coli scares, many buyers now require wide bare-earth buffers between crops, water and non-crop vegetation - leading growers to rip out the grasses they'd planted in cooperation with resource managers. Where non-crop vegetation is considered protected habitat, as with the Salinas River, farmers are forced to give up productive acres." "In addition to ripping out native vegetation, farmers are taking other measures to discourage wildlife from hanging out in their fields. Where deer pose a problem, some growers have erected expensive eight-foot fences. Black plastic often covers the bottom of those fences so lizards and rodents can't crawl through. Where rats and voles are a concern, some farmers have placed poisoned bait stations at regular intervals along their crop rows. In other instances, growers have removed vegetation and ponds to reduce potential habitat." Perkins says most farmers are rooting for conservation and the environment, despite changes in their practices. "Last spring, the Monterey County Resource Conservation District surveyed more than 600 Central Coast farmers to gauge the extent of the conservation-food safety conflict. Of the leafy green growers, 41 percent indicated they had removed wildlife in response to pressure from auditors and others. Thirty-two percent had pulled out non-crop vegetation, and 7 percent had eliminated ponds or water bodies. More than half used bare-ground buffers and poisoned bait stations to keep animals out, and about 40 percent used traps and fences. All told, nearly 90 percent indicated they had adopted at least one measure to deter wildlife from cropped areas." While he supports the overall goals of the Leafy Green Marketing Agreement, Will Daniels, vice president of food safety at Earthbound Farm, says he is uncomfortable with some of its components. "Considering that the E. coli outbreaks have been traced to bagged greens, he feels there should be as much focus on processing facilities as on fields. Earthbound tests for pathogens in its farms' water and soil, but also in the raw products being processed." He even feels that these buyer-led initiatives may increase your risk of E. coli contamination. One thing is certain - everyone is desperate for science. "Throughout this discussion it's been an issue for the growers: Where do the standards come from and what supports them?" Perkins says. "We don't want to be doing too much and we don't want to do too little. The urgent need is more and better science on which of these precautions truly contributes to food safety." |
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