Opinion: Call For Cooperation
July 1, 2010 If there was a resounding theme at the sixth Florida Citrus Mutual Annual Conference, it was — Cooperation. Indeed, that was the major recommendation from the National Academy of Sciences review and report on efforts to defeat or live with citrus greening. One significant point of interest during the meeting was the idea of Citrus Health Management Areas (CHMA). These areas would coordinate growers, on a voluntary basis, to work together toward certain goals such as psyllid control.
Consensus Builder
Jerry Newlin serves as the chairman of the CHMA subcommittee and will help formulate a plan to create the zones on the map and recruit growers from different areas to drive buy-in of the CHMA approach. See Jerry’s take on CHMA here.
During the conference banquet, I had the honor of presenting Jerry the 2010 Florida Grower Citrus Achievement Award trophy. In introducing him, I noted how everyone that I had spoken to about Jerry pointed out his knack for working with all sides of an issue. He is a consensus builder with a firm voice, but one that is respected by all sides. He leads by example and exemplifies cooperation.
We’d like to thank Chemtura AgroSolutions for their continued sponsorship of the Citrus Achievement Award, which allows us to extend coverage of the program throughout the year. For the next few months, we will be featuring “Winner’s View” articles, which showcase Newlin’s insights on issues of the day. You also can watch videos of Jerry talking about citrus greening research.
Diverse Points Of View
While the Citrus Mutual conference emphasized industry cooperation, it did acknowledge there are different points of view on key issues surrounding citrus greening. During the educational session, a panel discussion was held on the traditional approach to address greening, versus the foliar nutrition approach often referred to as the “Maury Boyd” program.
Mike Irey, director of research for Southern Gardens, provided his view that the best hope to reduce greening is through psyllid control, scouting, and tree removal. He presented compelling data to back his case. Dr. Jackie Burns, interim director of the Citrus Research and Education Center, noted UF/IFAS still recommends tree removal, but recently has acknowledged that tree removal might not be economically viable when infection rates are too high, leaving foliar nutrition an option. Boyd was on the panel as well to discuss his program, which has captured the interest of many. Jerry Newlin, always the consensus builder, was on the panel and noted Orange-Co is pushing trees, but they also are closely monitoring developments with foliar nutrition.
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