Delayed NY Budget Delays Support Services for NY Farmers
Thursday, April 15th, 2010
It’s springtime in New York State. As they do every year, farmers turn their eyes to the sky and their hands to the ground in an annual ritual to gauge the timing of planting and a new year on the farm.
Seeds are ordered, and farmers are waiting for the ground to get warm and dry enough to plant.
This year, many New York farmers also have an eye on the state capitol, where past-due budget deliberations have resulted in a freeze on dozens of research projects and support services farmers rely on.
On April 1, the nonprofit NY Farm Viability Institute suspended 109 research and outreach projects that were funded through appropriations from the state legislature, and Department of Agriculture and Markets. The state’s proposed budget for 2010-’11 didn’t award funds to the Institute, and failed to re-appropriate funds awarded in form three of the four previous years.
Projects on ice
“We were in the process of hiring a coordinator when the governor’s proposed budget was released, and we made the decision to hold off hiring anyone,” said Jim Bedient, a grape grower from Penn Yan, and president of the NYS Wine Grape Growers Association.
The grape growers started a two-year project in January to launch a certification program for wine and juice grape growers that shows their fruit was grown with environmentally-friendly practices.
“We would like to put a logo on bottles of wine and grape juice, to let consumers know the product was grown in a standardized, sustainable way,” Bedient said. “A lot of our wineries get questions about how they produce grapes. A lot of our vineyards use sustainable practices, so this is a way to communicate that to customers.”
New York is home to hundreds of Welch’s grape juice growers who are under pressure from retailers to demonstrate that their products are grown with fewer pesticides and fertilizers, according to educators at Cornell University. Cornell developed a program, Vine Balance, to guide growers through the process of lessening environmental impact while maintaining grape yields. So far, 85 growers completed the program and others are underway.
The growers’ plan is for Vine Balance graduates to be eligible to use the eco-label on grape products. Long range, the certification program would be funded through grower fees.
“Our goal is to be self-funded, but the grant is a way to get the project up and going, to show growers that it works,” Bedient said.
In addition to jobs that aren’t being filled, more than 75 fulltime and part-time jobs that were funded through Farm Viability grants are now on hold, according to Institute officials. Those jobs include Cooperative Extension educators and project coordinators working at nonprofits and farmers organizations.
Something new
“We founded NY Farm Viability is 2005 to create something new in this state, an organization where public dollars going into research and outreach are directed by farmers, to put resources where they are needed the most,” said John Lincoln, chair of Farm Viability Institute’s board of directors, and a dairy farmer from Bloomfield.
Annually, the Institute requests proposals, which are reviewed by farmer volunteers. An all-farmer board of directors makes funding decisions. Each proposal’s likelihood for leading to measurable farm-level impact – increases in sales, reductions in operation expenses, etc. – is the driving factor for a grant award.
“Our over-riding philosophy is that we don’t reimburse project expenses until we have a quarterly report that shows progress on making farm-level impact,” Lincoln said. “Some state-funded programs spend money as soon as they get it, out of fear they won’t get funds again the next year, but we are trying to bring a level of accountability to our program.”
Since 2005, the Institute received annual appropriations from the state, ranging from $2 million to $5 million. The funds were in turn awarded for research trials, cooperative marketing efforts, education programs, and services, including business planning with trained financial advisors, and developing value-added products with the aid of food scientists to ensure food safety.
Projects typically lasts two to three years, and may be weather-dependant. All funds are awarded by reimbursement, which means the Institute doesn’t spend down its entire appropriation at the end of each year.
“In essence, the cut of re-appropriations penalizes the Institute for being good stewards with the state’s resources,” Lincoln said.
To date, 82 Institute-funded projects have completed. According to final reports, those projects worked with 2,118 farmers, and led to $26 million in new sales, $10 million in reduced farm costs, and $14 million in capital investments. In other words, the $7 million in grants brought about $50 million in annual economic impact at the farm.
In addition, farms created 230 jobs.
All farm sectors
The Institute makes a point of awarding grants to projects that work throughout agricultural: bioenergy, field crops, dairy, equine, fruit, green industry, livestock, maple, and vegetables. Projects work with farms of all sizes and production practices, from Long Island to Niagara County, from the North County to the Southern Tier.
Steve Reiners, an associate professor of horticulture at Cornell, planned to start two years of fresh market vegetable trials this spring.
“It’s mid-April and we are wondering what to do. Should we order seeds? We are in limbo,” he said. “We should have started seeds in the greenhouse by now.”
The trials included new varieties of standards like sweet corn, pumpkins, and broccoli, whose consumption, Reiners said, is on the rise, as well as newer products, including seedless watermelons and tomatoes with resistance to late blight, which decimated crops at many New York farms last year.
The trials were inspired by the increasing demand for local food. New York’s recent rise in winter and year round farmers markets was the impetus behind trials of turnips, beets, carrots and rutabagas.
“With more farmers selling year round, there is more interest in storage crops and fall root crops. We just don’t have information on how well some of these crops store,” Reiners said.
All of the crops in his trials have the potential to “help New York growers diversify and meet the demand for locally-grown.”
Reiners may ask companies to donate seed, but that still leaves him short the funds to hire two seasonal workers to tend the trials and gather data he planned to use to make recommendations to growers.
“Growers told us they want to see this work done, but finding the funds has been difficult,” he said.
By the numbers
A partnership between the Finger Lakes Resource Conservation and Development Council and Cornell University hopes to establish New York’s first Organic Dairy Farm Business Summary, a set of published data based on farm financial performance that farmers can use to identify where their own costs may be too high.
“It’s frustrating. We are trying to provide a service that we hope is beneficial to all in the organic dairy community. It required strides to get farmers to open up and share the financial information, so it’s a setback doubly to have to shut down,” said Dick Winnett, coordinator of the Finger Lakes RC&D council.
John Hanchar, a Cornell farm business educator, said that some organic dairy farmers are concerned that milk companies will limit expansion, or fail to renew contracts with farmers, in response to the downturn in the general economy.
“Some of that talk makes the organic producer think, ‘I need a better handle of the finances of my business.’ There is more interest in monitoring farm financial performance and identifying changes they need to make,” Hanchar said.
Without grant funds, there are fewer educators available to work with farmers.
Call to action
Since the proposed budget was released this winter, many farmers and agricultural support groups have contacted state legislators to protest cuts in funding to NY Farm Viability Institute.
Both the senate and assembly are reportedly working on plans that would restore funding to the Institute, although how much, and when those funds might be released, in not known.
“We all recognize that New York is in a tight place fiscally, and we understand budget cuts are in order. We are concerned that cuts to agriculture are disproportionate,” Lincoln said.
