Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
because its mission goes beyond basic research and productionism to
serve the applied needs of multiple constituencies. BIFS has been one of
SAREP's most successful, visible programs, helping it develop a clientele
in conventional commodity agriculture. Between 1994 and 2004, SAREP
coordinated funding for ten three-year BIFS partnerships, awarding six
of them to Farm Advisors, three to commodity and other agricultural
organizations, and one to a US Department of Agriculture scientist. BIFS
partnerships carried forward BIOS's emphasis on growers' participation
and social learning at a local scale, i.e., one county, or two adjacent
counties.
SAREP required BIFS grant recipients to create voluntary partnerships
that use the BIFS extension model, enrolling local groups of growers in
social learning, supported and led by management teams with growers'
participation.
13
In one sense, SAREP merely carries forward the recom-
mendation by the IPM pioneers of the 1950s to develop social relations
supportive of ecologically informed pest knowledge, monitoring and
management. Some BIFS partnerships reproduced the enthusiasm and
agroecological vision of BIOS, but others less so.
CAFF pointed to BIOS as a working model of integrated farming sys-
tems, and SAREP made similar claims about BIFS being an example of
the integrated farming systems approach called for by the National
Research Council. Both BIOS and BIFS developed the integrated farming
systems model beyond that recommended by the NRC by hybridizing
organic pest-management practices with the principles of applied
ecology in IPM, which is not surprising given the disproportionate
attention to insect pest control in California agriculture.
14
The integrated
farming systems approach marks a new stage in the use of ecological
ideas in agriculture because its moves beyond IPM's cultural strategies
to monitor and analyze the entire farming system so as to manage it
in an ecologically optimal way (within the constraints of economic
monoculture).
Engaging the Department of Pesticide Regulation
Governor Pete Wilson created the California EPA (CalEPA) during the
period when William Reilly and the USEPA were promoting source
reduction and pollution prevention. Most of the activities now carried
