Fruit Growers Are Environmentalists
October 23, 2012 There’s no question that fruit and vegetable growers are operating in a difficult environment, but growers – and their advisors – can use that environment to their advantage.
That was the thrust of the message imparted by Barry Bedwell, president of the California Grape & Tree Fruit League, to those attending the 38th annual conference of the California Association of Pest Control Advisers (CAPCA) this week in Anaheim, CA.
Bedwell said growers and PCAs should stress to the general public that pesticides are simply designed to protect plants, and that they are subject to intense careful precaution and intense regulatory oversight. Ag supporters need to keep in mind that despite the noise environmental activists make, they are not the ones who will make the call on the role of pesticides in food production.
“It will be the consumer who will determine if we have a domestic food supply,” he told a crowd of several hundred at the Disneyland Hotel. “Turn that regulatory environment into a positive.”
Bedwell complimented those in the audience, part of a record-high attendance of more than 1,200, for being involved with CAPCA. “Your being here makes a statement about your professionalism,” he said. “But you need to talk to the people who aren’t in this room because we’re all judged according to the bad apples.”
After all, ag faces difficult perception problems, particularly in California, said Bedwell, who serves on American/Western Fruit Grower’s editorial advisory board. For example, when he was lobbying a couple years ago for the spraying of a mating disruption pheromone to control the light brown apple moth, he was taken aback by the reaction of a San Francisco Bay area congresswoman. “Everyone in my district,” she told Bedwell, “is scared to death of cancer.”
More recently, the Stanford University study, which found conventionally produced foods are just as nutritious as their organic counterparts, has had organic activists hopping mad, he said.
“You would have thought that somebody said the worst thing in the world about their mother,” said Bedwell to laughter from the audience.
The most perceptive comment on the reaction of the organic activists, he said, came from one observer who put their virulent response in perspective: “What do you expect when you criticize someone’s religion?”
That’s what growers who use pesticides to produce a bountiful supply of fruits and vegetables are up against, said Bedwell, adding that the news isn’t all bad.
First, he encouraged the PCAs to support the Alliance for Food and Farming, which puts forth arguments based on sound science in support of America’s growers.
Second, he said there’s a new wave of Latino legislators whose influence is growing in the California Legislature. Bedwell finds them largely refreshing, because they are very pragmatic, and while they may be tough on labor issues, they are reasonable when it comes to environmental matters.
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