Plowing over agriculture - Florida firestorm

Here is coverage about the controversy in Florida about a possible cash grab from IFAS that would hurt the interests of Florida farmers. From the Feb.17 coverage:

Increasing age of farmers tempts many to grab off developer's bucks.
By JACK STRIPLING NYT Regional Newspapers
Rumors of agriculture's demise may have been greatly exaggerated, but there's cause for concern about the industry's overall bill of health, according to experts.A firestorm erupted earlier this month when Bernie Machen, president of the University of Florida, was quoted as saying agriculture was a "dying industry" unworthy of state investments. Machen has denied making the remarks, which were published Feb. 5 in a monthly agriculture newspaper. Even so, the ensuing controversy raises real questions about whether agriculture will play as pivotal a role in the 21st century as it has in the past.

Later....

A 2008 UF study placed the agriculture industry's total economic impact at $59 billion in Florida, when one includes the money spent by manufacturers that support the industry through equipment and supplies.The study itself indicates IFAS' continual efforts to prove its worth in the state.The institute, which has roots going back to the presidency of Abraham Lincoln, was designed to conduct research that would help improve agriculture across the state. With extension offices now spread across all 67 Florida counties, IFAS has an annual budget of $300.4 million and employs more than 2,300 people who are supported by state money and grants.(IFAS includes the Citrus Research and Education Center in Lake Alfred, the world's largest research facility devoted to citrus.)
Despite its long history and sprawling presence in the state, IFAS is undervalued, according to some faculty in the institute. And while Machen contends he didn't forecast the doom of agriculture in a public statement, there are a number of faculty who now say they see Machen as out of touch with the land-grant mission that created UF and IFAS.Actually, Machen has publicly backed major initiatives that rely on the institute's expertise. He was a major supporter of building a new center to fight infectious diseases that plague plants as well as humans. The institute also has a real presence in the university's alternative energy research, which Machen has called a key priority.But when it comes to the inventions UF is pushing into the marketplace, UF has focused mostly of late on biomedical research and technology."Is ag bio, other than energy, right now a very big part of the investment portfolio? No, it's really not," said David Day, director of technology licensing at UF.
The technology research that's helping UF to secure big grants and contracts is also in part what's helping to propel the university upward in national rankings.Machen has made moving UF into the top 10 public universities the over-arching goal of his presidency, and the trustees who approve his bonuses largely grade Machen on his ability to improve numbers that matter to U.S. News & World Report.While reaching for the top 10 may sound good to trustees, the intense focus on rankings is exactly what has some IFAS faculty on edge. A faculty member, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution, called Machen's focus troubling."What we read in the paper is that Machen wants to move UF into the top 10 Ivy League type of situation, and one doesn't get into the Ivy League by increasing yields of wheat per acre or solving citrus greening," the faculty member said. "(But) what is the use of being in the Ivy League if the ivy has some disease that pathology can't cure because it's been liquidated?"Faculty may be increasingly less inclined to publicly criticize Machen, and IFAS leaders aren't talking either.Jimmy Cheek, the senior vice president of IFAS, and his second-in-command, Joe Joyce, both refused to comment for this story.

TK: "What use is the Ivy League if the ivy has some disease that reserachers can't cure because they have been liquidated?" A well turned phrase, and clearly some university administrators need to educated again about the importance of agriculture in Florida.

Immigration and food safety

The linkage between immigration reform and food safety isn't often articulated. Is that because the argument is tenuous or that the linkage isn't commonly understood? Here is a comment from a grower, pubished here in The Buffalo News, and reprinted below.

Another Voice / Food safety
Immigration reform needed to protect U.S. produce
By Dennis BrawdyUpdated: 02/16/08 6:50 AM
The safety of our food supply was brought to the forefront in a recent scare due to a produce handler at a local Wegmans contracting the hepatitis A virus. As a vegetable grower in Eden Valley, I’ve come to watch these events with a lot of interest.
People obviously expect that the produce they purchase is safe and clean. After all, in the United States, we’re very focused on this. But what about the tomato grown in Mexico, or the avocado from Columbia? Would you ever know if the picker there had hepatitis? What if the packer had a gastric illness?
Do you believe these countries have the same sanitation standards? Yet today, a substantial portion of our food supply is imported, and no, they do not have the same standards.
Obviously, we all want a safe food supply. In the United States, many local growers are completing a very difficult certification from the Department of Agriculture in food safety and good agricultural practices. This program covers everything from worker training, sanitation practices and food handling standards to frequent audits and annual recertification.
This is important, and we want to be a part of it. Given recent scares with contamination of fresh produce, we recognize the need for a safe food supply. People want locally grown fresh produce with knowledge of how it was grown and handled.
In food safety, the United States has the highest standards in the world for domestic growers. Yet in our country, local growers are facing the greatest crisis we have ever faced in our business — the lack of a secure and legal labor force.
National estimates state that more than 75 percent of the agricultural work force is undocumented. The lack of practical immigration reform and enforcement- only policies have placed us and our livelihood at severe risk.
Due to this labor volatility, the Farm Credit Associations of New York have estimated more than 800 New York farms are severely vulnerable to failure, with total sales of $700 million per year, 750,000 acres of cropland and an estimated 15,000 jobs in the upstate economy on farms and in the farm sector.
The reality is these workers perform work that Americans do not want. Our workers are paid well, yet perform grueling, repetitive work in all types of weather and conditions.
In an economy that creates more jobs annually than it has new workers entering the work force, agriculture is left overwhelmingly reliant on an undocumented work force.
In the national immigration debate, calls for “no amnesty” and “send them all home” make wonderful sound bites on talk radio. Think about the results of this kind of rhetoric. Do we really want to force local growers out of business and increase our reliance on imported food?
Be careful what you wish for — the safety of your food supply may be at stake.
Dennis Brawdy is president of D&J BrawdyFarms in Eden

TK: All labor intensive agriculture shares in some of the same challenges in putting in place proper sanitation measures/food safety measures for their workers as they touch raw agricultural products, not to mention the environment's interaction with fruits and vegetables. The challenges are not unique to imported produce. To the extent the U.S. infrastructure and regulatory framework are more robust than any given farm in China or any other country, Brawdy's argument carries some weight. Yet to argue imported foods are less safe than U.S. food goes too far, in my thinking. We need immigration reform to provide a legal workforce for America's growers, and injecting food safety into the argument is not particularly germane to the debate.

Small steps vs. giant leap

It is an interesting question: can Americans stave off obesity with small steps such as taking the stairs or only by giant leaps, such as becoming acutely attuned to a diet regimen, frequent weigh ins and becoming excercise nuts? Research publicized here looks at the issue.
From ScienceDaily:

According to Rena Wing, professor of psychiatry and human behavior at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and director of the Weight Control & Diabetes Research Center at The Miriam Hospital, people who are most successful in preventing weight gain, and dieters who lose weight and keep the pounds off, have made major changes in their in diet and exercise routines.
Using new research findings, Wing will make her case for big behavioral changes to stave off weight gain at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Boston.*
"We live in an obesogenic environment that relies heavily on fast food, automobiles, and remote controls -- all which can be labeled as 'toxic' to maintaining a healthy body weight," Wing said. "With our research, we want to determine the most successful strategies for maintaining a normal weight in this toxic environment. We've found that bigger changes are needed for success."
Along with James Hill of the University of Colorado Denver, Wing founded the National Weight Control Registry, the largest prospective investigation of long-term successful weight loss maintenance in the world. The registry includes data on more than 5,000 men and women who have, on average, lost 70 pounds and kept the weight off for six years.
At the symposium, Wing and Hill will present alternative views of how to best address the obesity epidemic. The crisis is worldwide in scope -- health experts call it "globesity" -- with more than 1 billion adults overweight and at least 300 million of them clinically obese.
Hill will argue that small daily changes, say using the stairs, are enough to prevent incremental weight gain that can lead to obesity. Wing, however, will make the case that much larger life-style changes -- say exercising 60 to 90 minutes a day -- are needed to prevent weight regain.
"Our data from the National Weight Control Registry suggests strategies associated with successful weight maintenance include high levels of physical activity and conscious control of eating habits," said Wing. "Dieters who remain diligent about diet and exercise are much less likely to gain weight back."
Examples of conscious control include frequent weighing, following a consistent dietary regimen across the weekdays and weekends, and taking fast action if small weight gains are observed.
Wing will also present new research findings that support the notion that large behavior changes are necessary in maintaining a normal weight -- even in those who may not have to overcome a genetic or physiological propensity toward obesity.
"There's no way around it," Wing said. "If you want to lose weight and keep it off, you need to really change your lifestyle, particularly if you're overweight or have a family history of obesity. The obesity epidemic won't go away simply because people switch from whole to skim milk. They need to substantially cut their calories and boost their physical activity to get to a healthy weight -- and keep minding the scale once they do."
*The symposium entitled "Fighting the Global Obesity Epidemic: Small Steps or Big Changes?" will be presented Feb. 17, 2008

TK: Wing makes a good case, but caring that much about our diets takes a lot of work when there is so much else to care about. And excercising 60 to 90 minutes a day is a tall order, even when gym equipment is positioned directly in front of LCD televisions. It would be great if more Americans could rely on their cars less and instead walk to work in combination with mass transit. Thus, we could kill two birds with one stone, and going to the drive-through wouldn't be so easy, either. Meanwhile, the digital scale in the bathroom keeps staring accusingly at me as I continue to ignore it...