UNDOCUMENTED FARM LABOR SMALL PORTION OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS

LEGAL WORKERS WILL HAVE TO BE PAID MORE, TAX MAN SAYS.

I recently watched a news program that claimed 50% of tomato pickers and dairy workers are undocumented immigrants (aka illegal aliens).  I also saw a PBS report that vegetable farmers and vineyards in California are struggling to find enough labor.  These reports raise an obvious question: How much risk does the ag industry face from deportations?

According to the USDA, wages make up about 40% of costs in labor-intensive crops such as fruits and vegetables. The labor component is a big factor for those farmers who are struggling. I think farmers across the country are torn on the matter – on the one hand, they need low-cost farm labor to make a profit, and on the other, they would prefer to hire legal workers.

According to the Pew Research Center, an estimated 11.1 million illegal immigrants lived in the U.S. in 2014.  Somewhat surprisingly, only a small portion of those 11 million work as farm labor.  According to the latest Farm Labor Survey, the number of hired and contract farm workers ranges from about 800,000 in winter to 1.1 million in the summer. The portion of hired farm workers who are not legally authorized to work in the U.S. fluctuates around 50%, according to the USDA Economic Research Service. The other half comprises legal U.S. citizens (33%) and green card holders. Do all the math, and we’re running somewhere around 500,000 illegal U.S. farm workers, out of a total U.S. population of 327 million. That’s only 0.15% of the population, and there are many millions of people not working. 

The headline unemployment rate is about 5% now. It sounds like only 5% of the population is not working. Not so. The calculation has been changing for decades, and it excludes all kinds of people. When considering actual unemployment in this country, I look at the employment-to-population ratio, which is the number of people employed divided by the total number of working-age people. 

A February 2017 report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said that our employment-to-population ratio was 59.9%, which means 40.1% of working-age folks are not working. If you take approximately 200 million working-age residents and multiply them by 40%, you arrive at 80 million people. Bottom line, the workforce is available. But what does it take to motivate those folks to do farm labor?

According to a 2015 USDA report, average hourly farm worker pay was $12.27, which is above minimum wage, but well below the average hourly pay of $21.80. Motivating legal citizens with more pay may be one of the solutions. It could be difficult to get U.S. citizens to pick avocados for $12 an hour, but there is a number that will motivate them. Of course that number will have to exceed available benefits, which can include state unemployment payments, ACA subsidies, SNAP cards, SSI, Section 8 Housing, etc.

Another obvious solution would be to increase the number of green cards issued, which I suspect a business-minded administration will do. The last solution is increased mechanization, which has been under way for over 100 years.  (Did you know there are now strawberry picking robots?)

My opinion is that if it takes more pay to employ legal workers, as a society, we’re going to have to devote more pay to getting our vegetables out of the ground and fruit off of the trees. That will mean higher costs for fruits and vegetables. If it takes more machinery because people won’t do the work, then we’ll have to invent it.  Life will go on, and people will eat.

WHEAT LOSING GROUND IN 2018 PROJECTIONS

Wheat has been losing ground – literally – to corn and soybeans since sowing peaked at 88.25 million acres in 1981. The last time plantings topped 70 million acres was 1997 at 70.4 million. The last time they exceeded 60 million acres was 2008 at 63.6 million. At its Outlook Forum, USDA projected the smallest all-wheat acreage – 46 million – since 1919 due to low market prices and vast world stocks following four years of record crops. 

By coincidence, soybean plantings, projected for a record 88 million acres this year, would nearly match wheat’s 1981 total. 

The International Grains Council and the FAO forecast a dip in world wheat production by about 2% this year, led by the projected 20% drop in the U.S. crop.

This article was produced in collaboration with the Food & Environment Reporting Network, an independent, nonprofit news organization producing investigative reporting on food, agriculture, and environmental health.

FG to reinvent cassava bread initiative – Ogbeh

The Federal Government has revealed plans to revive the cassava bread initiative to encourage the use of cassava in food production and processing.

The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, made this known in Abuja during an interaction with journalists.

Ogbeh lamented that although Nigeria was the largest producer of cassava in the world, the economic and industrial potential of the crop had yet to be fully explored and utilised.

The minister  expressed confidence that the restoration of the cassava bread initiative would curb importation of wheat, as flours used for baking bread will be produced from both wheat and cassava.

He added that this initiative would save a lot of foreign exchange, being used in importing wheat, for Nigeria, as well as encourage cassava farmers to increase their productivity.

According to him “The use to which we have put cassava has been very low. We haven’t produced industrial starch even though we are trying to revive textiles, we haven’t done ethanol, we are importing ethanol”.

“We haven’t exported cassava chips because of the cost of transportation from the hinterland to the ports.The bread one is still coming up. There is something you must add to bread if you use the cassava flour called bake shop.

“There is a Nigerian who wants to come and set up the factory here. You add that so that the bread can rise; that is what we are waiting for, it will be done.’’ he said

Ogbeh said that the Federal Government was also working to get flour millers to add 15 per cent cassava in the wheat they milled.

AgroNigeria recalls the cassava bread initiative was launched by former president Goodluck Jonathan in 2012, which was made from composite flour containing 40 per cent cassava and 60 per cent wheat.

#FactsFeed

FG warns Nigerians on smuggled harmful frozen fish

The Federal Government has alerted Nigerians that smugglers are beginning to flood the markets with harmful frozen fish illegally imported into the country through land borders.

This was revealed by the Minister of State for Agriculture, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri while speaking at the Abuja headquarters of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD).

According to him, the harmful frozen fish include tilapia, red pacus, river bream, pangassius, horse mackerel, sardine and croaker.

The Minister noted that those involved in the act were undermining the efforts of government despite the fish importation policy and ban of frozen farmed fish importation into the country.

He lamented that the circulation of unhealthy fish and fishery products in Nigerian market had resulted in grave health implications such as kidney disease and cancer.

“It has become necessary for the Federal Government through the FMARD to address the Nigerian public on the sale of smuggled unhealthy frozen fish, especially farmed tilapia, in Nigeria. These smuggled frozen fish are very harmful to the health of Nigerians” he said.

The minister therefore warned those involved in the illegal importation to desist, as anyone caught will be made to face the full wrath of the law adding that the government had been collaborating with countries in the Gulf of Guinea, Nigeria Customs Service, maritime police, Nigerian Navy and the Nigerian Agriculture Quarantine Service.

“The ministry is using this medium to warn all those involved, colluding, aiding and abetting these nefarious activities to stop or face the full wrath of the law of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Importation of fish without licence attracts five-year imprisonment or a fine of $250,000, or both, in addition to forfeiture and destruction of the vessel and its products” he vowed

“For the avoidance of doubt, the Federal Ministry of Agriculture has put in place measures to arrest, detain and prosecute offenders as provided in the Sea Fisheries Act Cap S4 laws of the Federation 2004. Such persons will be dealt with as criminals and economic saboteurs” he stated.

BUMPER HARVEST: WHEAT PRICE CRASHES IN KANO

As farmers begin wheat harvest in Kano, investigations have revealed that its price in most of the grains markets in the ancient city has crashed.

A visit to Dawanau grains market, one of the largest produce markets in West Africa, revealed that it was flooded with new wheat, a situation that crashed the price of the commodity from N34,000 per 100kg bag to N15,000.

A business man in the market, Alhaji Danliti, said the recent crash was one of the lowest recorded in recent years.

He added that along with the price crash, patronage has dropped as against the normal trend.

“There are a lot of changes witnessed this year. From all indications, there is a bumper harvest of wheat this year, but the farmers are suffering because the price wasn’t favourable to them and the commodity seems to flood the market,” he said.

Malam Mahe Waziri, a wheat farmer at Bagwai irrigation site in Kano, said the farmers thought the bumper harvest would put smiles on their faces but regretted that the market price wasn’t favourable.

However, Abdu Iro, a wheat merchant, said the crash in wheat price is temporary as the commodity will regain its value in the market soon.

SOURCEDaily Trust

3 BIG THINGS TODAY, MARCH 16

SOYBEANS, CORN LOWER OVERNIGHT; USDA EXPECTED TO RAISE GLOBAL STOCKPILES FORECASTS.

1. SOYBEANS, GRAINS LOWER IN OVERNIGHT TRADING AHEAD OF WASDE REPORT

Soybeans and grains were lower in overnight trading ahead of a major crop report due out at noon in Washington, D.C.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is expected to raise its expectations for global carryout in its monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report today. It’s also expected to increase its projection for Brazilian corn production, according to surveys.

Researcher INTL FCStone earlier this week raised its estimate for Brazilian corn production to 109.1 million metric tons, up almost 5 million tons from a prior outlook, according to Reuters.  

Soybean futures for May delivery fell 5½¢ to $10.16¼ a bushel overnight on the Chicago Board of Trade. Soy meal lost $1.30 to $329.80 a short ton, and soy oil declined 0.30¢ to 33.24¢ a pound.  

Corn futures for May delivery lost 1¼¢ to $3.71 a bushel in Chicago.

Wheat futures for May delivery fell 1½¢ to $4.45½ a bushel overnight. Kansas City futures declined 2¢ to $4.64 a bushel.

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2. USDA EXPECTED TO RAISE OUTLOOK FOR GLOBAL CORN, SOYBEAN STOCKPILES

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is expected to raise its outlook for both global corn and soybean stockpiles.

World carryout of corn is likely to be pegged by the USDA at about 219 million metric tons, up from 217.6 million a month ago, according to analysts. The agency’s U.S. inventories estimate is likely to be unchanged at 2.32 billion bushels.

Brazilian production will likely be estimated at about 88 million tons, up from 86.5 million last month, while output in Argentina will probably be unchanged.

Soybean stockpiles globally will be projected at just north of 81 million metric tons, up from 80.4 million last month, analysts said. The USDA’s domestic inventories outlook is expected to decline to 414 million bushels from 420 million in February.

The agency’s estimate for production in Brazil will probably be raised to 106 million metric tons from 104 million a month ago. Output in Argentina is estimated to be little changed from February at about 55.5 million tons, according to industry projections.

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3. DRY WEATHER REMAINS IN PARTS OF MIDWEST; NORTH EXPECTED TO SEE DANGEROUS WIND CHILLS

The red-flag warnings for much of the Midwest and Southern Plains are gone this morning after several fires broke out yesterday.

There’s still a small patch of land, encompassing about 18 counties along the borders of Colorado, Nebraska, and Kansas, that are in a fire warning, according to the National Weather Service.

In North Dakota and Minnesota, along the Canadian border, temperatures and wind chills are expected to reach dangerous levels tonight. Wind chills are pegged as low as -40˚F. overnight, the NWS said in a report early Thursday.

“Dangerous wind chill values will persist into Friday morning with an improvement in conditions as the day progresses,” the agency said. “Wind chill values will dip into the -15˚F. to -30˚F. range again Friday night into Saturday morning.”

DROUGHT-TOLERANT WHEAT ON THE WAY

CANADIAN NON-GMO DROUGHT-RESISTANT WHEAT MAY ENTER REGISTRATION TRIALS IN 2017.

Look for a grinning, midsize lab-coat guy this winter, wearing dark glasses possibly, at the CFIA Variety Registration Office in Ottawa or Toronto. Julian Northey plans to be there, toting his paperwork, to register a new durum wheat for trials in western Canada.

If it happens and if it holds up to scrutiny, the new durum wheat will be a breakthrough in drought-tolerant technology.

Northey earned a doctorate in plant molecular genetics in 2009 from the University of Toronto. A year later, he launched Frontier Agri-Science (FAS), an agricultural biotechnology company specializing in non-GMO genetic technology.

FAS now has a team of seven scientists with serious credentials and a website listing partnerships with four Canadian universities as well as BASF, Biogemma, and ICRISAT, the international crops research institute for the semiarid tropics (frontieragri.science).  

The new durum is a product of the platform that specializes in water-use efficiency and stress tolerance. Other platforms are directed toward herbicide tolerance and biofuel production. The September 28 FAS durum harvest, with six lines of foundation seed, was long awaited.

“We’ve been working on this for four years, and we feel it has great promise in drought resistance. The science itself has been 10 years in development,” Northey says.

For Ontario wheat producers, he says, “We will be starting to select this (trait) in bread wheat very shortly.”

HOW IT OCCURRED

Without going into the detailed biochemistry, Northey says the original discovery leading to his drought-resistance work occurred in the lab where he worked on his doctorate.

It involved the chemical modification of a protein, in a process that hyper-sensitized the simple plant Arabidopsis (the fruit fly of plant genetics research used exclusively in a lab setting), to a stress hormone so that it became drought-resistant.

“In the organism that we studied, it can theoretically happen to approximately 700 different proteins,” Northey says. “The job of my doctorate was to find out which one of the 700 was important in modulating the stress response.”

As he searched, the molecular geneticist developed a chemical-based genetic selection platform. It is a chemical-based screening process that results in non-GM plants. Theoretically, it can be applied to any crop to search for stress tolerance.

15 to 20 
The percent yield increase new drought-tolerant durum wheat may glean over current commercial varieties.

“We’re screening on a chemical, looking for resistance to a particular chemistry. When those plants are resistant, they turn out to be drought-resistant. In fact, that turns out to be about one in a million. It’s a very arduous, very challenging screening,” he says.

Chemical technology underlying this drought-screening platform is a trade secret.  

After his success with Arabidopsis, Northey gradually upgraded the technology for genetic screening into crops with more and more complex genomes. In the plant kingdom, FAS went from a diploid dicot (Arabidopsis) to a tetraploid monocot (durum).   

“We felt the genetics were a little simpler in durum than in bread wheat. Now we’ll soon be using the platform to select novel traits in bread wheat,” he says. “An amazing thing is that we can essentially take any variety globally – Egyptian, Australian, Russian – and apply this platform to theoretically improve it for water efficiency purposes.”

The publication of his recent research using Arabidopsis genetics and the genetic pathway was published last July 25 in the journal, Nature Plants.  

“It is a breakthrough; that’s why it’s in Nature Plants,” he says. “We have flipped, on its head, decades of common thinking about what leads to drought resistance with this particular plant hormone. It’s the exact opposite of what everyone was thinking, and essentially it was my doctorate.”

In previous fieldwork using the original discovery in GM canola or corn under moderate to severe drought conditions, yield has been improved up to 60% more than plants that didn’t contain the GM technology.

“In canola, the yield increases are around 15% to 20%,” he says. “That gave me the scientific confidence to start the company and work seriously at integrating this technology into various crops.

“We hope to have significant yield increases under water-limited conditions in non-GM wheat,” he adds.

Referring to the new durum wheat, he says, “I think it’s realistic to look for a 15% to 20% yield increase over current commercial varieties.”
When the new lines go into registration trials, an industry will be watching.

HYBRID WHEAT BY DECADE’S END

Wouldn’t it be great if wheat farmers could glean hybrid vigor akin to what cattle producers get in a black baldie calf resulting from crossing a Hereford bull with an Angus cow? These days, maybe they can.
Syngenta plans to launch hybrid wheat in the U.S. by 2020. Bayer Crop-Science has also been working on hybrid wheat with a similar time line.

Hybrid wheat has long been a gleam in the eyes of farmers and wheat breeders. Physiologically, though, it’s often been difficult for pollen from this self-pollinating crop to travel long distances. Other hurdles have included lack of seed production on the female side, susceptibility to fungal diseases, and added seed costs.

However, Darcy Pawlik, Syngenta’s product lead for cereals, notes tools that will help make hybrid wheat a reality including:

• Native trait stacks
• Doubled haploid breeding
• Marker-assisted recurrent selection
• Long-term genetic base improvement
• Boost from Barley

Syngenta is using the same platform to develop hybrid wheat as it did for hybrid barley that is now commercialized in the United Kingdom.

“Hybridization will revolutionize the way wheat is grown,” predicts Patricia Malarkey, who heads research and development for Syngenta.
So far, yields in North Dakota have been 10% to 15% higher than conventional varieties, say Syngenta officials. “With hybrid wheat, you can take the best of both parents and get an additive effect,” says Pawlik.

BOOST FROM BARLEY

Syngenta is using the same platform to develop hybrid wheat as it did for hybrid barley that is now commercialized in the United Kingdom.

“Hybridization will revolutionize the way wheat is grown,” predicts Patricia Malarkey, who heads research and development for Syngenta.

So far, yields in North Dakota have been 10% to 15% higher than conventional varieties, say Syngenta officials. “With hybrid wheat, you can take the best of both parents and get an additive effect,” says Pawlik.

Countdown to FNS 2017

Without any doubt, agriculture is this nation’s saviour in the face of the current economic realities. However, achieving this feat cannot occur without stemming the nation’s overdependence  on importation of farm produce. Hence, revitalising agricultural productivity is of the essence.

As a key step towards facilitating the engagement of the private sector, as well as all critical stakeholders in the agric sector, AgroNigeria in collaboration with its sponsoring partners is organising the first ever Feed Nigeria Summit (FNS) 2017, to discuss strategies to drive progress in the Nigerian agriculture sector.

The summit under the theme “Feed Nigeria to Feed Africa”, is a first of its kind in Nigeria, and will bring together prominent stakeholders, NGOs, government officials and ministries, campaigners, continental and international players and other influencers in the agricultural space, to discuss bugging issues aimed at advancing development of the agriculture sector in Nigeria.

Venue: Grande ball room, Intercontinental Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos State

Date: Thursday 6th – Friday 7th April, 2017

Time: 8am Prompt

For more enquiries, contact: 08099207555, 08033321575,

This event is strictly by invitation.

Nigeria will reclaim her lost glory through agriculture- Lokpobiri

Nigeria’s Minister of state for agriculture, Heineken Lokpobiri has guaranteed that agriculture will be the nation’s economic hero.

The Minister who made this assertion during a facility tour to the Atlantic Shrimps Farm in Badagry, Lagos stated that Nigeria can reclaim her lost glory from Agriculture, far more than it was over the years.

Commending the efforts of the owners of the farms, he noted that substantial investment in the sector has not only started increasing foreign earnings, but has provided jobs for over 1000 Nigerian youths.

The minister expressed that with this renewed interest to diversify the economy through agriculture Nigerians and interested expatriates should for more investments in the sector which he described as the surest alternative avenue for wealth creation, employment generation, food security and wellness.

He also stated that government would entrench all efforts to support and promote investment in Nigeria.