Each week we round up the latest N.C. agricultural headlines from news outlets across the state and country, as well as excerpts from the stories. Click on the links to go straight to each paper’s full story.
- “Cotton surges, tobacco drops in NC farm forecast,” Hendersonville Times News: The U.S. Department of Agriculture says cotton is up and tobacco is down in North Carolina for 2010. The agency issued a forecast on Wednesday predicting North Carolina farmers will plant 540,000 acres of cotton this year, a 44 percent increase over last year’s 375,000 acres. Cotton plantings have declined for three straight years. State Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler says a drop in cotton supplies has led to higher prices, making the crop more attractive to farmers. Farmers are also expected to cut back on winter wheat and tobacco. The USDA forecasts that roughly 164,000 acres of flue-cured tobacco will be planted in 2010, down about 6 percent from 2009.
- “Poultry jobs to grow in N.C.,” News & Observer: A Mississippi poultry processing company is becoming a major economic engine for Eastern North Carolina. Sanderson Farms already is building a massive poultry processing complex in Kinston its first operation in this state. That $121 million project is expected to open next year, eventually employ up to 1,500 people and create new business for hundreds of chicken farmers in the Lenoir County area. Late Monday, Sanderson also announced it’s considering construction of another facility near Goldsboro, in adjacent Wayne County. The $94 million plant would produce boneless chicken breasts and other products and could employ another 1,100 people if it opens as planned in 2012. The news is a bright spot for the state’s beleaguered chicken industry, which has been hurt by a glut of supply in recent years, surging costs and weaker overseas demand. In 2008, Pilgrim’s Pride closed its processing plant in Siler City, throwing hundreds of employees out of work and hurting chicken farmers in that area. The poultry industry employs more than 20,000 people statewide, according to the N.C. Poultry Federation. …
- “Lily farmers race the clock toward Easter,” Charlotte Observer: To the untrained eye, the graceful lilies that arrive on church altars each year on Easter Sunday are a familiar symbol of resurrection and renewal. Like poinsettias on Christmas, it just wouldn’t be Easter without them. But for the people who get them there – on a date that shifts from year to year – making the flowers bloom on cue takes months of perfect gardening, mathematical deduction and extreme diligence. “It is by far the most complicated single thing that happens in the floricultural industry,” said William Miller, professor of horticulture at Cornell University. Researchers like Miller have drawn up schedules for greenhouses with how-to instructions specific to the date Easter arrives in a given year, chronicling the steps once lily bulbs arrive in mid-October from bulb growers on the West Coast. Week by week, the guidelines suggest the exact period for cooling the bulbs (six weeks), best greenhouse temperatures (in the 60s) and how long the buds should be at various points in the growing process. …
- “Prawns for profit,” Durham Herald-Sun: Parents, sometimes your kids playing on the Internet pays off. Literally. Joe Thompson, the winner of the Gilmer L. and Clara Y. Dudley 2010 Small Farmer of the Year for North Carolina, an award given annually during the N.C. Small Farms Week activities at N.C. A&T, experienced just that. Thompson, 61, a prawn farmer, was given the award after successfully transitioning his tobacco farm into a full-scale prawn-growing operation, one of only a few in North Carolina, according to Thompson. A prawn is a freshwater crustacean, similar to a shrimp. Thompson nearly missed out on his good news. “I didn’t open it because I knew it was not me,” Thompson, a native of Alamance County, said about receiving his notification letter. …
- “Folk ‘cure’ sold locally high in lead Greensboro News & Record,” Greensboro News & Record: When an employee with the Guilford County Department of Public Health walked into the African and Caribbean market to ask for “Nzu,” a traditional remedy for morning sickness, it seemed a common request. The clerk readily produced small, unlabeled bags of what looked like dried clay — Nzu (pronounced new-zoo) — for a few dollars apiece, sold under brand names including Calabash Chalk, Calabar stone, La Craie, Argile and Mabele. Not so common were lab test results when the health department sent off the samples to be analyzed. …
- “Orange County OKs farming center plans,” News & Observer: The proposed Piedmont Food and Agricultural Processing Center for four counties took a big step forward when Orange County commissioners approved an agreement spelling out terms last week. The center is scheduled to open in July. It will be southeast of Hillsborough at 500 Valley Forge Road, off N.C. 86 just north of Interstate 85. Orange County’s approval comes about 16 months after a study determined that such a center would not only be feasible, but should turn a profit of $150,000 by its third year. Gross profits for farmers who will use the center are estimated at more than $2.65 million a year. The five-year agreement states that the facility will potentially serve 16,214 farms in 22 counties within a 75-mile radius of Hillsborough and have a customer base of 3.3 million people. The accord is the result of meetings among officials of Alamance, Orange, Durham and Chatham counties. “And we do feel like we have an agreement that will be beneficial to everybody,” said Alamance County Manager Craig Honeycutt …
- “The buzz on bees and crops,” News & Observer: In the past five years, as the phenomenon known as colony-collapse disorder has spread across the United States and Europe, causing the disappearance of whole colonies of domesticated honeybees, many people have come to fear that our food supply is in peril. The news this week that a Department of Agriculture survey found that American honeybees had died in great numbers this winter can only add to such fears. The truth, fortunately, is not nearly so dire. But it is more complicated. There is good news: While some areas are seeing a shortage of bees, globally the number of domesticated honeybee colonies is increasing. The bad news is that this increase can’t keep up with our growing appetite for luxury foods that depend heavily on bee pollination. …
- “FDA warns against drinking raw milk,” Charlotte Observer: The Food and Drug Administration has said it more than once, and they’ll say it again: Don’t drink raw milk. The FDA says there are 12 confirmed cases of illness in Michigan after consumers drank raw milk from Forest Grove Dairy in Middlebury, Ind. According to the agency, raw milk may contain a wide variety of harmful bacteria – including salmonella, E. Coli and listeria – that can sicken and even kill people. Raw milk has gained popularity with some who say pasteurization destroys nutrients. The FDA says that’s not true, and there is no “meaningful nutritional difference” between pasteurized and raw milk. The agency says there were a total of 1,614 reported illnesses, 187 hospitalizations and two deaths from consumption of raw milk between 1998 and 2008. …
- “Farmers, science look to tobacco as a biofuel,” Durham Herald-Sun: Some researchers say an age-old cash crop long the focus of public health debate could be used to help solve the nation’s energy crisis, by genetically modifying the tobacco leaf for use as a biofuel. The golden leaf is the latest in a series of possible biofuels like switchgrass and algae that are being floated as Congress and President Barack Obama stress the importance of securing alternative energy sources. Scientists believe using tobacco would be beneficial because it would not affect a major U.S. food source, unlike other biofuels made from corn, soybeans and other crops. …
- “Push to eat local food hampered by slaughterhouse shortage,” Wilmington Star: Erica Zimmerman and her husband spent months pasture-raising pigs on their farm here, but when the time came to take them to slaughter, an overbooked facility canceled their appointment. With the herd in prime condition, and the couple lacking food and space to keep them, they frantically called slaughterhouses throughout the state. After several days they found an opening, but their experience highlights a growing problem for small farmers here and across the nation: too few slaughterhouses to meet the growing demand for locally raised meat. In what could be a major setback for America’s local-food movement, championed by so-called locavores, independent farmers around the country say they are forced to