Media report on value of ag and ag research

As Californians wait patiently today for the state budget vote, scheduled for 4 o'clock this afternoon, it's a good time to review the value of agriculture and agricultural research as it has been reported in the press in recent days.

Last Wednesday, Western Farm Press ran an Almond Board press release about a symposium that took place earlier this summer in Sacramento. At the symposium, UC ANR associate vice president Rick Standiford noted that there has been a 24 percent reduction in UC Agricultural Experiment Station researchers and Cooperative Extension staff since 1990.

The story said UC's academic staff is expected to shrink through retirement with 66 percent of UC Extension farm advisors set to retire in the next 10 years.

Almond yields have increased 86 percent over the last two decades largely because of improved horticulture techniques developed through publicly-funded agricultural research and development and extension.

A consequence of a slowdown in growth of public research spending "could be a decline in global competitiveness for California agriculture," the story said.

Last week, AgAlert ran a story on California's agricultural revenue in 2007, which reached $36.6 billion, an increase of 15 percent over the previous year's total of $31.8 billion.

The news about the industry isn't all good, however. Reporter Christine Souza sought comment from the director of the UC Ag Issues Center, Dan Sumner, about farmers' struggle to pay for increased input costs, such as fuel and fuel-based products, water, wages, equipment, government fees and taxes.

"What has everybody worried is that if output prices start coming down they are concerned that the input prices, particularly anything with an oil base or fossil fuels base, will stay high and that includes fertilizer and all of the energies," Sumner is quoted.

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