MORGAN HILL, Calif. — In the half-light of a winter evening here, a tawny calf skitters across the pasture after its mother, a Lazy T brand visible on its right hip. The brand, used by the Tilton Ranch since Janet Burback’s parents settled on this land in 1917, appears on the ranchers’ shirts, their trucks and their business cards.

To Ms. Burback, the brand is a matter of pride and tradition. “Anybody who’s still branding their cattle, that’s the last hold on something their grandparents and great-grandparents started,” she said.

But it is also a matter of necessity. When a cow strays or falls into the hands of rustlers — still a significant threat — it is the brand she counts on to bring the animal home.

So, like many other ranchers in California and other Western states, Ms. Burback looks with suspicion on a federal plan to institute an identification system for cattle, one that emphasizes numbered ear tags rather than brands as the official markers of a cow’s identity. Ranchers worry that the new regulation, in the final phase of revision, represents a first step toward ending branding, a method they regard as the most visible, permanent and reliable way of identifying who owns which cow.

Federal officials have long argued that a national identification system is necessary to quickly trace outbreaks of diseases like bovine brucellosis, tuberculosis and mad cow, and that it would protect not only the health of animals and humans but also the cattle industry, which suffered in 2003 after the discovery of mad cow disease in a dairy cow in Washington State.

But cattle ranchers have not been enthusiastic about mandatory ear tags. An earlier federal proposal that started with a voluntary trial met with fierce opposition and was scuttled in 2009.

The new rule would require tagging — either with radio frequency devices or lower-cost metal “brite” tags — of cattle moved across state lines. Each tag would carry a unique numeric code. Stored in a database, the codes would allow animal health authorities to determine rapidly where an animal came from in the event of a disease outbreak.

Aware that it is treading on delicate territory, the Department of Agriculture has included an exception in the rule, allowing brands to be used as unofficial identification in trade between states that agree to accept the method. Fourteen states have brand inspection laws, most of them in the West and Southwest.

Yet many ranchers remain deeply skeptical. The department received close to 1,600 comments on the proposed regulation, many of them negative. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association has given qualified support to the proposal but said it would also like some parts clarified, and the inclusion of branding as an official identification method.

Opposition is especially strong among ranchers in California and other Western states. Although the Agriculture Department has said it will initially provide metal ear tags at no cost — the electronic versions cost $2 to $4 apiece — many ranchers believe the program will prove more costly than federal officials have predicted. And they are leery of federal intrusion into their business practices.

“It all comes down to a bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., behind a desk making the rules and deciding what’s best for you as a rancher and you as a ranching family, and that’s what people distrust,” said Kevin Kester, president of the California Cattlemen’s Association. The association, Mr. Kester said, opposes the rule in its current form and has written to the Agriculture Department asking for revisions, including greater recognition of branding and raising the age at which cattle must be tagged.

Most ranchers here say they recognize the need for some sort of tracking system and many, like Ms. Burback, use electronic ear tags in addition to branding, but as a marketing tool rather than for identification. The electronic tags are increasingly important in exports to other countries, which account for about 15 percent of American beef and just over $5 billion in sales. Japan and South Korea both require electronic identification tags that verify the animal’s age and place of birth.

And some in the industry are ardent supporters of the federal plan. Jim Warren, the owner of 101 Livestock, an auction market in Aromas, Calif., said he thought the rule made sense. “It’s a no-brainer,” he said.

Mr. Warren, who sells electronic identification tags to the Central Valley producers who send 35,000 cows a year to his auction market, said the ear tags are a way for ranchers to say, “I raised this animal, it came from my place and I identified it, so if there is a problem you can trace it back to me and I stand behind it.” Brands, he believes, are outmoded and less efficient in helping officials track down disease threats because ranchers in different states can register the same brand, making tracking difficult when animals are commingled in feed lots.

The tags, which are stapled into an animal’s ear, are also less painful for the cow, Mr. Warren said.

“I just want to get away from it because I think we’ve got a better way,” he said.

But for most ranchers, ear tags will never inspire the same love and trust as the double sixes, circle Ts and other symbols that have marked cattle since the Spanish arrived in the early 1700s. And they worry that even with the nod to branding in the federal proposal, in an age of increasing reliance on electronic devices, it would eventually spell the end of the cattle brand.

Jack Lavers, a sixth-generation rancher whose family has run cattle in the mountains north of Bakersfield since 1858, said that when electronic identification tags were instituted in Australia, brand inspectors stopped paying attention to brands. He fears the same will happen here.

“In this industry, time is money,” he said. “It’s human nature. We’re eventually going to get lazy about it and the brand inspectors are going to say, ‘Well, this electronic brand matches the brand ownership,’ and quit looking at the brand.”

But ear tags, Mr. Lavers said, can be cut off by rustlers — 1,200 to 1,400 cows are stolen each year in California, according to the state Department of Food and Agriculture’s bureau of livestock identification — or torn off in thickets or on rocky bluffs as cows make their way across the rough country that typifies much of California’s grazing land.

And while he appreciates the lore and tradition of branding — “the heraldry of the range,” as the historian J. Evetts Haley called it — Mr. Lavers said he brands for hard, practical reasons.

“I don’t brand my cattle to just brand them for fun,” he said. “I’m not doing it just to burn an animal. I’m doing it because it’s a permanent mark of identification. It’s scarred into the hide, and it’s there forever.”

Every five years, Congress passes a Farm Bill.  It funds just about everything related to agriculture – including international trade, rural development, and crop payments to some farmers.  U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says California’s $37 billion agriculture industry benefits too -especially the state’s fresh produce growers.

Vilsack: “When you consider the commodity purchases that we do through the United States Department of Agriculture – for school lunch programs, for food banks across the country – they are substantially focused on fruit and vegetable purchases.  So that obviously benefits producers who are producing those fruits and vegetables.”

Still, Vilsack acknowledges that debate over the federal deficit will likely mean less money for the 2012 Farm Bill than in previous years.  And the secretary says direct payments to farmers will likely be reduced.

Listen to Ben’s (Adler )interview with Secretary Vilsack, where they discuss the Farm Bill, trade, food and nutrition programs and food safety:

http://www.capradio.org/articles/2012/01/23/vilsack-2012-farm-bill-will-be-smaller,-but-still-boost-california

WASHINGTON, Jan. 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — The Humane Society of the United States and the United Egg Producers announced that they will make passage of H.R. 3798, the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments of 2012, introduced today by Reps. Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., Jeff Denham, R-Calif., Elton Gallegly, R-Calif., and Sam Farr, D-Calif., a top legislative priority in Congress this year. All of these lawmakers are deeply committed to agriculture, and their federal legislation will lead to improvements in housing for 280 million hens involved in U.S. egg production, while providing a stable future for egg farmers.

The bill will require egg producers to essentially double the space allotted per hen and make other important animal welfare improvements during a tiered phase-in period that allows farmers time to make the investments in better housing, with the assurance that all will face the same requirements by the end of the phase-in period. The legislation is strongly supported by UEP, HSUS, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) and other animal welfare groups, National Consumers League, the overwhelming majority of egg farmers, and state agricultural and egg producer groups, including the Association of California Egg Farmers, Colorado Egg Producers Association, Florida Poultry Association, Michigan Agri-Business Association, Michigan Allied Poultry Industries, North Carolina Egg Association and Ohio Egg Processors Association.

In recent years, a growing number of states approved often-conflicting standards for egg production, frequently applying those standards to all eggs sold in the state – including those produced out-of-state. As a result, egg farmers have said they foresee an unworkable patchwork of conflicting state laws that will make interstate commerce in eggs difficult, if not impossible. Egg farmers see a federal standard as the only solution that both enhances hen welfare and ensures a sustainable future for America’s family-owned egg farms, according to the United Egg Producers, which represents egg farmers who produce 88 percent of the nation’s eggs.

“Eggs are a national commodity, and egg producers should have a level playing field – not have different, costly rules in all 50 states,” said Gene Gregory, president and CEO of United Egg Producers. “That’s where we are heading if we don’t pass this federal legislation. We need this legislation for our customers and consumers and the survival of egg farmers.”

“The HSUS and UEP have been long-time adversaries, but have come together and identified a solution that balances animal welfare and the economic realities of the industry,” said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States. “The nation needs this kind of problem solving, and the Congress should enthusiastically embrace an agreement between all of the key stakeholders.”

“This agreement between the United Egg Producers and the Humane Society of the United States represents an important and necessary step in addressing the patchwork of state laws facing the industry and providing stability for farmers moving forward,” said Rep. Schrader. “I take my hat off to both organizations for putting aside their historical differences and working together to reach a deal that provides certainty for our farmers while providing improved conditions for the hens.”

“As an advocate for agriculture and animal welfare, I am pleased to join my colleagues in co-sponsoring this common-sense legislation that will help farmers, consumers and animals,” said Rep. Farr, ranking member of the agriculture appropriations subcommittee. “Having consistent rules and a national standard will help egg producers meet the consumer demand for safe, wholesome food and will send a message that doing what’s good for animal welfare and what’s good for industry economics are not mutually exclusive.”

H.R. 3798, the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments of 2012, would:

• require conventional cages to be replaced during an ample phase-in period with new, enriched colony housing systems that provide all egg-laying hens nearly double the amount of current space;
• require that, after a phase-in period, all egg-laying hens be provided with environmental enrichments, such as perches, nesting boxes, and scratching areas, that will allow hens to express natural behaviors;
• require labeling on all egg cartons nationwide to inform consumers of the method used to produce the eggs – “eggs from caged hens,” “eggs from hens in enriched cages,” “eggs from cage-free hens,” and “eggs from free-range hens”;
• prohibit feed- or water-withdrawal molting to extend the laying cycle, a practice already prohibited by the United Egg Producers Certified program;
• require standards approved by the American Veterinary Medical Association for euthanasia of egg-laying hens;
• prohibit excessive ammonia levels in henhouses; and
• prohibit the transport and sale of eggs and egg products nationwide that don’t meet these requirements.

THE PORTERVILLE RECORDER

Organic produce is no longer just for Birkenstock-donning, flannel shirt-wearing, long-haired hippies from San Francisco.

That stereotype is long gone.

What isn’t gone — and doesn’t appear to be going away any time soon — is a burgeoning group of consumers throughout the world who desire fresh fruits and vegetables that are free of synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

John France, a local farmer and businessman, is one of many who has answered consumers’ call for these crops, which can be labeled and sold as “organic” only if they meet certain federal regulations and criteria.

France, a certified grower of organic crops since 1989, is the president of Porterville-based Homegrown Organic Farms, which markets and sells 15 different organic commodities for 45 farmers throughout California and Oregon.

Last year, Homegrown administered the sale of more than 1 million cartons of organic produce for its growers. The company’s cold storage and main distribution center, from which the organic goods are shipped nationwide and to Canada, is located in the small Kern County town of Arvin.

“There’s not a market in the world that I can’t access,” said France, whose own ranch, which is managed by Strathmore-based farm agriculture management company Agricare, is home to about 650 total acres of organic citrus, grapes, walnuts and blueberries in southern Tulare and Kern counties.

For France and other organic producers, the markets are certainly there. The only potential obstacle is one of logistics.

Unlike conventional farmers, organic growers don’t apply post-harvest fungicides to their produce. These fungicides, in some years, can drastically extend the shelf life of some fruits and vegetables.

So France said he and his organic brethren “have to be on top of [their] game,” making doubly sure that the crops are picked, packed and sold when the time is absolutely right. If not, the growers could suffer badly by losing out on adequate returns for their commodities.

“We can’t just park stuff in a cold storage,” France said. “We have to know what’s in the cooler, how old it is, the condition of the fruit and when it comes out.”

In this way and others, organic farming is different from conventional farming.

Organic producers have to grow organically for three years before they can become certified by federally accredited California Certified Organic Farmers. Their handling costs are higher, and they have to be more “proactive” rather than “reactive” to make sure certain problems — ones that would be handled by traditional farmers with pesticides or other chemicals — don’t arise in the first place.

In a lot of ways, though, organic farmers are the same as their big brothers on the conventional side.

Organic producers, just like traditional growers, have to keep their yields as high as possible. They have to know soils and climates, too. Most importantly, they have to deliver a quality product that consumers want.

“If you’re not prepared and don’t know what you’re doing,” France said, “you can get upside down really quick.”

But France hasn’t gone upside down — not even close. That’s because he’s made the proper investments, he’s developed a solid business model and he’s immersed himself in a market that seems to be growing by the day.

“You have to be willing to spend money to make money, just like in any business,” he said.

Contact Alex K.W. Schultz at 784-5000, Ext. 1050 or aschultz@portervillerecorder.com.

Follow him on Twitter @AlexKWSchultz.