Join the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development for a webinar on the recently announced application window for the Community Connect Program. Applicants will have an opportunity to learn about the program’s requirements and application process.
The Community Connect Program helps state and local governments, federally-recognized Tribes, nonprofits, and for-profit corporations extend broadband service in rural, economically-challenged communities where access does not currently exist. The application window for fiscal year 2021 is currently open and will close on December 23, 2020.
The upcoming webinar will provide more information.
Tuesday, October 20, 2020 8:00 – 9:30 a.m. Pacific Time Register today
Rural Development staff will provide an overview of the Funding Opportunity Announcement, major eligibility and regulatory requirements, the application process, and provide guidance on how to submit a successful grant application. Participants will also have an opportunity to ask questions.
UC Cooperative Extension hosts a meeting on nutrient management and provides a translator for Mandarin speakers
NOTE – In an effort to celebrate and highlight the work of California’s farmers, farmworkers, and everyone whose work helps to keep the food supply chain flowing, CA GROWN has marked October as California Farmer and Farmworker Month.
By Pamela Kan-Rice
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted life for everyone, with information about COVID-19 changing daily. For Californians who aren’t fluent in English, obtaining reliable information is particularly difficult. Aparna Gazula, a University of California Cooperative Extension advisor who serves Santa Clara, San Benito and Santa Cruz counties, has been providing COVID-19-related information in Chinese and Spanish for immigrant Bay Area farmers.
In March, when restaurants shut down to curb the spread of the virus, many restaurants and wholesale produce markets cancelled produce orders placed with farmers. Language, cultural differences, low computer literacy and limited access to computers created barriers for small-scale, immigrant farmers in the Bay Area to quickly find new buyers for their perishable produce. Gazula introduced them to food banks, hoping they would accept the produce donations, but the food banks were not set up to pick up donations from small farmers.
Most small-scale farmers lack the financial capital to absorb the revenue shock. To help offset losses from unsold specialty crops, the UCCE advisor and Qi Zhou, the small farm program assistant specialist, have been helping Asian and Latino farmers complete English-language disaster aid applications.
“Since March, we have helped farmers apply for Covid-19-related farmer relief funds,” Gazula said. So far, she said, four of the 17 immigrant farmers who applied to the American Farmland Trust Farmer Relief Fund have received a total of $4,000, and 10 farmers of the 30 who applied to the California Family Farmer Emergency Fund received a total of $42,500.
Recently the U.S. Department of Agriculture expanded the list of specialty crops eligible for its Coronavirus Food Assistance Program to include bok choy, daikon and other vegetables with a deadline of Sept. 11. Communicating by phone and the app We Chat, Gazula and Zhou, who speaks Mandarin, notified local farmers, and advised them how to apply for the disaster funds. Zhou, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service rangeland management specialist Ling He and another NRCS staff member assisted 64 farmers in completing applications over the past week.
Bob Kuang, president of the Bay Area Chinese Growers Association, shares UCCE information with the association’s growers.
“Most of my members don’t understand English so they [UC Cooperative Extension] help, like for policy and safety,” Kuang said, providing information the growers can’t find elsewhere in Chinese.”
When she was a girl, Gazula saw how hard farmers work to make a living off the land while spending summers and winter breaks at her grandparents’ farm in India, where they grew rice, mung beans and chili peppers.
“Farmers are very hardworking people, and small farmers even more so as they manage everything on the farm,” said the small farms and specialty crops advisor. “Their grit, determination to succeed and hardworking spirit truly inspire me.”
“I’d like to help them be successful as much as I can,” she said, “be it research-based information to farm successfully or bilingual support to help them better navigate regulations or apply for grant funds.”
In addition to helping farmers apply for financial relief, Gazula alerted the farmers to shelter in place rules and is delivering COVID-19 safety information about masks, sanitation and social distancing requirements in Chinese and Spanish to them.
“We also helped farmers implement COVID-19-related protocols on their farms,” she said. “We are currently putting together 200 COVID-19 kits that will help farmers comply with worker health and safety-related protocols on their farms. The COVID-19 kits contain reusable masks, hand sanitizer, bilingual Cal OSHA guidelines for employers regarding COVID-19, and a resources sheet listing where to buy the enclosed items.”
When she’s not involved in COVID-19 crisis communications, Gazula continues to conduct research on nitrogen uptake in bok choy and bell peppers and irrigation management. She collaborates with Linda Chu, Guo Ping Yuan, Han Qiang Kuang and other Santa Clara County growers who allow the farm advisor to study crops on their farms.
“They do research, like test irrigation systems for right amount of water for the crop and nutrition – fertilizer – for the crop. They do lot of things,” said Bob Kuang, of the Bay Area Chinese Growers Association, who provides land at his farm in Gilroy for UCCE studies.
Gazula also advises farmers on how to implement the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) on their farms and fulfill irrigated land nitrogen reporting. Fines for not complying with regulations can threaten the economic sustainability of small family farms.
Although the majority of growers she works with regularly have limited English and need assistance filing reports to the government, others consult her for production information they can’t get elsewhere for the specialty crops they grow. Farmers of Korean, Japanese, Indian and Vietnamese ancestry and others attend meetings to learn the latest research on Asian vegetables such as daikon radish, napa cabbage, bok choy, on choy and various Asian leafy mustard crops including gai choy and pea shoots.
Gazula, who joined UC Cooperative Extension in 2016, currently works with about 180 small-scale growers in San Benito and Santa Clara counties and hopes to expand her outreach to farmers in Santa Cruz County.
To help small farmers adapt to climate change, Gazula and Zhou partnered with UC Agriculture and Natural Resources’ Healthy Soils Program staff and Santa Clara County Farm Bureau for technical assistance and held workshops during the winter. Zhou helped the farmers apply for grants from the California Department of Food and Agriculture’s State Water Efficiency & Enhancement Program and Healthy Soils Program. The 22 farmers who received CDFA grants brought a total of $424,111 into Santa Clara County.
The outreach work UC Cooperative Extension does wouldn’t be possible without the help of bilingual staff such as Zhou, the scientist Gazula hired with grant funds in September, and some translation support from partner organizations and growers as well.
“Relying on partners for translation support isn’t practical,” Gazula explained. “Outreach is most effective when it is targeted. It’s not just literally translating words, but translating the information the words convey. Because we provide outreach materials to comply with regulations, the language in these materials is very technical and it’s important that the information is presented accurately. We also depend on relationships with the farmers to extend the information within their communities. Long-term, it’s easier to do outreach with support from our own staff.”
Competition is stiff for money to serve non-English-speaking Californians because the state is home to so many immigrants with different needs. The majority of the grants she uses for outreach are for food safety. The local Open Space Authority, which promotes preserving land for open spaces, has also provided funds for small and beginning farmer outreach and education.
Gazula draws on the expertise of fellow UC Cooperative Extension farm advisors across the state. For example, she said, Richard Smith, who specializes in vegetable production, and Michael Cahn, who specializes in irrigation and water resources, are always willing to help, even though they are not assigned to serve Santa Clara County.
“Farmers already have tremendous challenges when it comes to being successful,” Gazula said. “I feel language barriers and lack of access to the same resources as fluent English-speaking growers shouldn’t be the reason they can’t farm successfully.”
Since you can’t bring your classroom to us, we’re bringing our insect pavilion to you! Students will learn all about pollinators, their importance in California agriculture, and their contribution to sustaining our environment. They will also learn about invaders! The invasive species that impact our statewide agriculture, how to recognize them, and learn ways to prevent them!
Fully virtual experience
Contains interactive and educational activities, handouts to download
Focuses on pollinators, invasive species, biodiversity, & climate change
In an effort to celebrate and highlight the work of California’s farmers, farmworkers, and everyone whose work helps to keep the food supply chain flowing, CA GROWN has marked October as California Farmer and Farmworker Month.
Taken from a USDA news release
Today, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced $19.1 million in grants to provide training, outreach, and technical assistance to socially disadvantaged and veteran farmers and ranchers. USDA’s Outreach and Assistance for Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers and Veteran Farmers and Ranchers (2501) Program is managed by the USDA Office of Partnerships and Public Engagement (OPPE).
The following California projects were included:
The Asian Business Institute and Resource Center in Fresnoreceived a grant of $237,500 to conduct outreach and training to ensure Southeast Asian farmers are aware of USDA programs that benefit their work in terms of financial resources, resources for growth, environmental practices, and long-term economic sustainability.
The Napa Valley Farmworker Foundation received $347,700 for training and education that builds the financial literacy of current socially disadvantaged farmers, socially disadvantaged farmworkers who are current farm operators and prospective farm owners, and socially disadvantaged youth in the Napa Valley.
Pie Ranch in Pescadero CA received $400,000 for to provide opportunities to beginning and early-stage farmers and ranchers of color, women, former farm workers, Black, Latinx and Indigenous American producers, and people from under-resourced communities, who have experience working on farms and are ready to take the next step to establish a land-based enterprise.
The USDA will fund approximately $17.6 million in grants (PDF, 501 KB) issued to 49 organizations conducting outreach and assistance for socially disadvantaged and veteran farmers and ranchers in 28 states. This funding is made available through the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act and the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2020.
The 2501 Program was created through the 1990 Farm Bill to help socially disadvantaged farmers, ranchers, and foresters, who have historically experienced limited access to USDA loans, grants, training, and technical assistance.
The 2014 Farm Bill expanded the program’s reach to veterans. Grants are awarded to higher education institutions and nonprofit and community-based organizations to extend USDA’s engagement efforts inthese communities. Projects funded under the 2501 Program include but are not limited to conferences, workshops, and demonstrations on various farming techniques, and connecting underserved farmers and ranchers to USDA local officials to increase awareness of USDA’s programs and services while filling the needs for increased partnerships. Since 1994, the 2501 program has awarded 533 grants totaling more than $138 million.
NOTE – The innovation and stewardship of farmers and ranchers have been a boon for working lands and made California the leading state in food production for more than 60 years. In addition to meeting basic nutritional needs of people around the world, these achievements have positioned California at the forefront of international culinary trends and iconic hospitality and visitor venues.
As we move forward to maintain that position with Climate Smart Ag practices that include carbon sequestration, it’s important to remember that the common thread in meeting nutritional needs and sequestering carbon is healthy soil. We know that conservation practices to store carbon in the soil also increase climate and drought resiliency, improve nutrient cycling, protect groundwater, improve water infiltration and water holding capacity, and enhance biodiversity.
Harnessing the innovative spirit of California, Governor Gavin Newsom today advanced an executive order enlisting California’s vast network of natural and working lands – forests, rangelands, farms, wetlands, coast, deserts and urban greenspaces – in the fight against climate change. A core pillar of Governor Newsom’s climate agenda, these novel approaches will help clean the air and water for communities throughout the state and support California’s unique biodiversity.
“Once again, California is taking on the mantle of global climate leadership and advancing bold strategies to fight climate change,” said Governor Newsom. “The science is clear that, in our existential fight against climate change, we must build on our historic efforts in energy and emissions and focus on our lands as well. California’s beautiful natural and working lands are an important tool to help slow and avert catastrophic climate change, and today’s executive order provides important new tools to take on this existential threat.”
The order directs state agencies to deploy a number of strategies to store carbon in the state’s natural and working lands and remove it from the atmosphere. The order also sets a first-in-the-nation goal to conserve 30 percent of the state’s land and coastal water by 2030 to fight species loss and ecosystem destruction.
Specifically, state agencies are directed to pursue innovative actions, strategies and partnerships to maximize the full climate benefits of our natural and working land, through:
Active forest management to reduce catastrophic risk and restore forest health; and
Boosting green infrastructure in urban areas like trees and parks.
California’s lands provide an important resource in limiting the impacts of climate change while protecting our communities from climate change-driven events such as wildfire, floods, droughts and extreme heat. The state’s natural and working lands sustain our economy, support our unique biodiversity and contribute to the global food supply.
California is considered one of the world’s 36 “biodiversity hotspots” because of its high concentration of unique species that are also experiencing unprecedented threats. Of the estimated 5,500 plant species found in California, 40 percent are “endemic,” found nowhere else on Earth. California relies on 100 million acres of land for food, water and habitat, and feeds the nation and world through its agricultural activities. The $50 billion California agriculture industry produces over 400 commodities, including over a third of the nation’s vegetables and two-thirds of the nation’s fruits and nuts.
In advancing this executive order, California joins 38 countries to support the global effort to achieve protection for 30 percent of the planet by 2030. The executive order directs the California Natural Resources Agency to form a California Biodiversity Collaborative to bring together experts, leaders and communities to pursue a unified approach to protecting biodiversity and develop strategies to support the 30 by 30 goal. Through this inclusive stakeholder process, Californians will help chart the path forward to these critical conservation goals.
30 by 30 has been championed internationally and is supported by a concerted United Nations effort. In addition, international NGOs and business groups – including the International Chamber of Commerce – wrote a letter in June calling upon CEOs to push governments to include ambitious policies to reverse nature loss as part of green recovery plans. The World Economic Forum recently calculated that $44 trillion of economic value generation – over half the world’s total GDP – is potentially at risk as a result of climate change and the dependence of business on nature and its services.
Today’s executive action follows Governor Newsom’s historic executive order in late September to require that, by 2035, all new cars and passenger trucks sold in California be zero-emission vehicles.
The text of today’s executive order can be found here and a copy can be found here.
In an effort to celebrate and highlight the work of California’s farmers, farmworkers, and everyone whose work helps to keep the food supply chain flowing, CA GROWN has marked October as California Farmer and Farmworker Month.
“This month was born out of the desire to thank our farmers and farmworkers for working tirelessly through the pandemic to keep food on the grocery store shelves,” said Cherie Watte Angulo, executive director for CA GROWN. “As communities sheltered-in-place, the industry quickly regrouped, supplying the proper PPE to the workforce and shifting food headed toward foodservice to retail outlets and food banks where need was the greatest.”
Farmer and Farmworker month, the first of what will be many years of celebrations, is marked by social media and retail campaigns throughout the state. Northern California Raley’s is taking part in the month by highlighting the crops California produces.
“Raley’s is proud to sell more than 4,000 items that are either grown in or produced right here in California!” said Chelsea Minor, Raley’s Corporate Director, Public Affairs. “We have been supporting local farmers and producers since our inception. We look forward to bringing ‘CA Happy Hour at Home’ to households across California to enjoy local food and wine pairings.”
California agriculture not only feeds people across the U.S. and around the globe, but the industry is an economic driver for the state, supporting 1.2 million jobs and providing $263 billion in total generated revenue for the state.
“It takes many hands to bring food from the farm to the table. I salute the hardworking farmers, ranchers and farmworkers for what they do every day – but especially this year – to make California the country’s top milk producing state and the supplier of one-third of the vegetables and two-thirds of the fruits and nuts in the U.S. A vibrant agriculture sector is essential in taking care of humanity’s most basic needs,” said California Secretary of Food and Agriculture, Karen Ross.
Californians are encouraged to participate in the month by using the hashtag #CAGROWN on social media posts. For every public social media post using the hashtag, CA GROWN will contribute a pound of food to a local food bank. “People can participate by simply taking a moment to thank their farmers at their favorite Farmer’s Market, make a meal using CA GROWN ingredients, or download our fun coloring sheet and talk to their kids about farming and the people who grow their food,” said Watte Angulo.
For more information about CA GROWN’s Farmer and Farmworker Month, visit our website here.
The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), the UC Davis Department of Viticulture and Enology, and the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences are offering laboratory services, with limited capacity, to test winegrapes and wine for the presence of smoke compounds due to recent wildfires. In addition to commercial laboratories already performing tests, these laboratories are offering limited services to hopefully reduce testing turnaround times.
“We are hearing many growers and grower representatives voice concern over lab turnaround time, as lab results are needed to make a decision about harvesting their winegrapes or to assess the resulting wines,” said CDFA Secretary Karen Ross. “To answer a need in our world-renown California wine industry, CDFA is proud to partner with UC Davis to offer the resources of our laboratories.”
“The wine and grape industries of California are important to the state and to our college, “ said Helene Dillard, Dean of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences at UC Davis. “The wildfires this year have been particularly devastating, so we are very happy to be partnering with the CDFA to apply our collective resources to this important issue.”
“Our staff members are working diligently to meet the laboratory needs of the wine and winegrape industries resulting from the unprecedented number of wildfires on the west coast,” said Gordon Burns, CEO of ETS Laboratories. “We appreciate the partnership of CDFA and UC Davis as we work together to answer industry needs.”
CDFA’s Center for Analytical Chemistry (CAC) is offering grape analysis. CDFA’s limited testing capacity is estimated to be 30-50 samples per day, with a turnaround time of 3-5 days, as long as a backlog does not occur. If a backlog does occur and the turnaround time will be longer, CDFA will provide that information on its website.
The UC Davis laboratories are teaming-up to provide wine analysis.
While the analytical methods of the CDFA and UC Davis labs have been validated and are accurate, the methods are not ISO 17025 (International Organization for Standardization) accredited. Therefore, growers should verify with insurance providers and/or legal counsel that the results will be acceptable before submitting samples. The laboratories will measure seven smoke-related compounds (guaiacol, 4-methylguaiacol, o-cresol, p-cresol, m-cresol, syringol, and 4-methylsyringol).
Today is the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations’ first-ever International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste.
“Reducing food losses and waste is essential in a world where the number of people affected by hunger has been slowly on the rise since 2014, and tons and tons of edible food are lost and/or wasted every day,” the FAO announced. “Food loss and waste also puts unnecessary pressure on the natural resource base and on the environment, depleting the natural resource base and generating greenhouse gases.”
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) Food Recovery Hierarchy also prioritizes actions organizations and individuals can take to prevent and divert wasted food.
Goats being evacuated out of the path of the Glass Fire near St. Helena. Photo from the Los Angeles Times
A new series of wildfires erupting in Northern California in recent days has resulted in additional fairgrounds opening as animal shelters, evacuation centers, and fire camps.
Fairgrounds in Petaluma (Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds) and Gridley (Butte County Fairgrounds) are newly available to house animals evacuated out of the path of the Glass and North Complex fires – chickens, goats, pigs, donkeys, horses, llamas, rabbits, sheep. ducks, quail and turkeys, so far. Additional animals are anticipated.
To facilitate evacuations, CDFA utilizes CARES, the California Animal Response Emergency System. Partners in this program are the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, local animal control agencies, and volunteer organizations on the ground providing urgent assistance to animals and the people who care for them. CDFA personnel act as coordinators for evacuation activities and are currently engaged in Butte County.
A total of 17 fairgrounds are now serving as community resource centers during wildfires throughout California, and they are presently housing more than 365 animals between them, also including a bull, dogs, cats and koi.
