UC Blog
Yudof responds to May Revise
Yudof responds to May Revise
Governor Jerry Brown released his revised state budget proposal yesterday, May 16. The governor’s revised budget holds UC cuts to $500 million, but also described reductions that would be proposed should the state adopt an “all-cuts” budget in lieu of extending certain temporary taxes.
“The governor in his budget document asserted that, in an all-cuts budget, reductions in state funding for the University of California would be doubled, to $1 billion in cuts,” President Yudof said in a statement released in response to the proposal.
“Doubling the cut would reduce the state’s contribution to the university’s core funds – monies that pay professors and staff members, light the libraries, maintain the campuses, and all the rest – to roughly $2 billion. State funding of UC at this diminished level has not been seen since the early 1990s, a time when the university enrolled 80,000 fewer students.”
Yudof’s full response can be read at http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/25564.
On Wednesday, UC Regents will discuss the budget. They will establish budget reduction targets for the fiscal year in light of significant reductions in state funding. Their agenda is posted at http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/regmeet/mar11.html.
ANR’s budget reduction target will be announced in the next ANR Update.
View or leave comments for the Executive Working Group
This announcement is also posted and archived on the ANR Update pages.
Ventura celebrates strawberries
Leading up to the California Strawberry Festival, to be held this weekend at Strawberry Meadows at College Park in Oxnard, the Ventura County Star championed the fruit's contribution to the local economy in an article published yesterday.
In 2009, strawberries contributed $515.4 million to the county's $1.6 billion of total agricultural revenues, the story said. That was up 31 percent from $393.5 million in 2008.
Ventura County agricultural commissioner Henry Gonzales said the next crop report will show growers added another 100 acres of strawberries in 2010.
"It's a good thing," Gonzales was quoted. "It says to me there's still room for growth in the production side because there's growth on the market side."
Reporter Stephanie Hoops contacted UC Cooperative Extension strawberry advisor Oleg Daugovish to get his take on the current strawberry season.
The article said Daugovish described the season as "decent."
Meanwhile, strawberry growers are feeling pressure from a controversy over a new soil fumigant, methyl iodide, which the Department of Pesticide Regulation approved in December.
"Concern about the ability to use it is great," Daugovish was quoted.
In March, Gov. Brown said he plans to take "a fresh look" at the DPR decision. Environmental and farmworker groups are opposed to methyl iodide use in agriculture, but DPR approved the pesticide's use under strict safety measures, including buffer zones and site-specific permits from local agricultural commissioners.
Strawberries make a significant contribution to the Ventura County economy.
Agritourism in agriculture's heartland
Thirty percent of the farmers offering agritourism events supplemented their regular farm income by $50,000 or more in 2008, according to a study by the UC small farm program that was covered on the front page of today's Fresno Bee. Nearly two-thirds of California agritourism operators planned to expand or diversify over the next five years.
"There is no question that there is a lot of potential for growth, and we are seeing it happen," the story quoted Shermain Hardesty, small farm program director and a co-author of the report.
In the article, reporter Robert Rodriguez described several Valley agritourism destinations:
- Visitors can stay the night on the 95-acre tree Dinuba farm of Nori and Mike Taylor.
- Farmer John Olivas lets people pick their own fruit and operates a fruit stand on his three-acre berry farm in Hanford.
- Fresno farmer Mike Smith will allow people to pick their own flowers, lavender and produce on his 40-acre organic farm. In the fall, he will operate a pumpkin patch for the public and school tours.
"We know from all the consumer trends that people are willing to pay for an authentic experience and for specialty foods," said Ellie Rilla, community development adviser for UC Cooperative Extension in Marin County and co-author of the study. "And agritourism provides that."
The research article, California agritourism operations and their economic potential are growing, was published in the current issue of California Agriculture journal.
Bringing in visitors for a dinner in a barn is one form of agritourism.
Dan Sumner a part of NY Times animal cruelty debate
New laws were proposed this spring in Iowa, Minnesota and Florida that would make it a crime to take undercover videos or photos at industrial farms, a tactic often used to show mistreatment of animals and unsanitary conditions, the New York Times reported.
In response to this development, the Times invited nine experts to debate issues related to farm animal welfare. The director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, Dan Sumner, took part in the discussion, noting that in addition to legal and moral questions, there are economic issues worth considering.
In his essay, titled Economics in the Hen House, Sumner outlined Proposition 2, a law voters approved in 2008 that ends the use of conventional cages in California egg production by 2015. Sumner said the new law will ban eggs that 95 percent of buyers now choose - less expensive, conventionally produced eggs - and allow only more expensive "free range chicken" eggs, which are already available, but rejected by the vast majority of shoppers.
He believes the use of graphic images in the campaign detracted from an informed policy debate about the potential impacts of Proposition 2. Emotional appeals with ugly images can sway a public debate, he said, while noting that farmers also use their own favored images to garner support for farm policy.
"A picture may be worth a thousand words, but sometimes a few numbers and some evidence may be worth even more," Sumner concluded.
Hen house living conditions are part of the animal welfare debate.
UC helps small scale farmers ensure food safety
Bee reporter Robert Rodriguez spoke to the owner of an eight-acre Fresno County farm.
"We have been farming for 40 years and have never had a problem, but now we have to document, document, document. I almost burned out my copy machine," the farmer was quoted.
To help growers develop written food safety plans, UC Cooperative Extension small farm advisor Richard Molinar is holding training seminars in English, Spanish and Hmong.
"We knew that the retailers were asking the packinghouses and wholesalers for the food-safety documents and they were beginning to start asking it from the farmers," Molinar was quoted. "They wanted to see written policies in place."