Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
received from SAREP for the Anderson brothers' study paid for his
research expenses, and he reported provocative results.
Bob Bugg's interest in the ecological dynamics on organic farms dated
back to the late 1970s. An entomologist with an agroecological bent,
Bugg had heard of the Anderson brothers' organic/conventional compar-
ison through his work at SAREP. In 1992, Rick Reed of the Community
Alliance with Family Farmers came to his office and proposed they put
together what he described as a “Rolls Royce extension project” for
reducing pollution from almond orchards. As program director for
CAFF, Reed needed a project that would serve small growers but would
have a broader impact on agriculture. CAFF understood that its claims
about the viability of alternative agriculture were unpersuasive without
a viable example. After tossing around a few ideas, Reed and Bugg
recalled the Hendricks study in Glenn Anderson's orchard. So they paid
it a visit.
The Community Alliance with Family Farmers blended political advo-
cacy with outreach to ecology-oriented and family growers, drawing
these priorities from its two parent organizations. Students and faculty
at UC Davis began the California Agrarian Action Project in the 1970s
because they were angry with what they perceived to be indifference to
labor, environmental, and consumer issues in the UC agricultural
research agenda. CAAP was one of the plaintiffs in the tomato harvester
lawsuit. The California Association of Family Farmers was founded in
1983 to address the needs of small growers in the San Joaquin Valley.
They worked together on several projects of mutual interest during the
1980s, including advocacy for the creation of SAREP to serve their con-
stituents. In 1993, they joined forces to create the Community Alliance
with Family Farmers, keeping the acronym CAFF.
2
One of the earlier projects these two parent organizations had worked
together on was the development of a research agenda to serve the needs
of small and environmentally oriented growers. After the National
Research Council published
Alternative Agriculture
, two California bal-
lot propositions were prepared to provide funds for alternative agricul-
tural research, and the possibility of change was in the air. The two
organizations of CAFF wanted a research agenda ready should funding
for alternatives become available. With other NGOs, they consulted
forty small growers to create a research agenda titled “Farmers for
