Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
CAFF reached out to the Almond Board of California (ABC) to
gain funding for the
BIOS for Almonds
manual. The ABC provided
BIOS funding and a degree of legitimacy with some conventional grow-
ers. In turn, the ABC could argue to regulators that it was supporting
environmentally responsible research, and to growers it was supporting
innovative research. The chair of ABC's production research committee
emphasized that the manual represented continued research and learning
about almond production, not pesticide reduction, even though the bulk
of the manual emphasizes new ways of thinking and farming. In
all, almond BIOS operated in five Central Valley counties during the
1990s with $2.8 million in funding. By the time CAFF ended the almond
BIOS program, more than 87 growers with roughly 20,000 acres of
demonstration orchards—and who managed more than 33,000 acres—
had participated in the partnership.
11
Many, many more growers and
PCAs had learned about BIOS techniques. CAFF also participated in the
almond Pest Management Alliance partnership between 1998 and 2002
(figure 3.3).
CAFF insisted that what they had demonstrated to be successful in
almonds could be reproduced in other commodities. The example of
BIOS and the advocacy of CAFF stimulated legislators, public agency
officials, and philanthropic foundations to fund and create funding pro-
grams for more partnerships. The two primary funding programs have
been SAREP's Biologically Integrated Farming Systems and the
Department of Pesticide Regulation's Pest Management Alliance (PMA)
program, but other funders emerged. Informal groups of local growers
also adopted partnership strategies.
Creating the Biologically Integrated Farming Systems Program
To legislators, CAFF argued that the BIOS model yielded benefits for
growers and protected environmental resources. Reed helped write and
lobbied for Assembly Bill 3383, signed by Governor Pete Wilson in the
fall of 1994. This subsequently became known as the Biologically
Integrated Farming Systems (BIFS) bill, establishing a BIOS-like compet-
itive grants program at SAREP.
12
Bugg and Reed identified unspent funds
in the Food Safety account at the Department of Pesticide Regulation,
the legislature appropriated $250,000 from it, and USEPA Region IX
supplied $420,000 to launch BIFS.
