The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (CDPR) visited Clovis this week to meet with agricultural organizations and representatives to provide an update on CDPR activities and hear concerns from agriculture.  Representing CDPR was Director Julie Henderson, Deputy Director Karen Morrison, Deputy Director for Enforcement Ken Everett, and Deputy Director for Environmental Justice and Equity Celia Pazos.  CDPR opened the meeting by providing a quick look at what they are currently working on including:

• Wrapping up their 5-year Strategic Plan to be released soon
• Working to streamline their pesticide registration process to shorten the time to register new pesticides
• Increasing staff
• Strengthening enforcement
• Finalizing their Advance Notification regulation in November for a tentative release in January.
• Working on the next set of 1,3-D restrictions to address concerns with innocent bystanders, which should be filed in November
• Working on next set of rodenticide restrictions with no timeline proposed

Association President/CEO Roger Isom was among the agricultural representatives in attendance and expressed concerns over invasive species, lack of alternatives if chemicals are phased out under the CDPR Sustainable Pest Management Program (SPM), concern that the legislature is regulating pesticides without science, and the need to coordinate with the California Department of Food and Agriculture on all these items.  Isom also expressed concerns with CDPR not addressing the rhetoric that is spewed at some of CDPR’s hearings and their lack of explanation of their intensive and robust registration process and their own regulations, which make them the toughest pesticide agency in the country.  Isom did express appreciation for the CDPR leadership to come to Clovis and sit down with agriculture moving forward.  Other groups in attendance included the American Pistachio Growers, California Table Grape Commission, California Citrus Mutual, Nisei Farmers League, and the Fresno County Farm Bureau.  In addition, the Monterey County Ag Commissioner Juan Hidalgo was present along with a representative from the Fresno County Ag Commissioner’s office. 

Senator Anna Caballero and current California Department of Food and Agriculture Chairman Don Cameron kicked off the new Ag Systems Certificate under the F3 Agrifood Technology Engineering Collaborative (AgTEC) program.  The Kickoff was attended by Association President/CEO Roger Isom and held in Fresno.  The certificate is designed to provide farmworkers and people interest in pursuing a career in agriculture and is administered by community colleges throughout the Valley.  The program provides these individuals with the opportunity to update their skills with current and emerging technology and software, while also emphasizing soft skills like communication and problem solving.  To obtain the certificate, the participant must complete all 14 core competencies which are provided through seven different community colleges in the Valley including Merced, Coalinga, Fresno City, Lemoore, Reedley, Clovis Community and Madera Community Colleges.  The 14 core competencies are:

• Digital literacy
• Basic equipment operations
• Basic equipment troubleshooting
• General agricultural systems fundamentals
• Crop production systems
• Tool operations
• Applied technical reading
• Interpersonal skills
• Animal production systems
• Food safety
• Basic safety
• Industry communication
• Applied technical writing

There already over 100 participants enrolled in the program.  For more information, please contact one of the participating colleges or you can reach out to Karen Aceves at Karen@arkeninc.com.

The California Cotton Ginners and Growers Association hosted Senate District 23 Candidate Suzette Valladares as part of a two-day agricultural tour in partnership with several ag organizations including the Western Agricultural Processors Association, California Fresh Fruit Association, California Citrus Mutual, and California Dairies, Inc.  For our part of the tour, Valladares met with the Cauzza brothers, Jake, Matt and Luc at their Cauzza Growers farming headquarters in Buttonwillow for an issues roundtable discussion.  She learned first-hand how their family farming operation began and how it works today, while learning about many of the challenges our industry faces on lack of pesticide tools, the impact of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), energy, air quality, and just the everyday trials and tribulations of farming in California today.  The tour is the first of many this year and part of the Association’s efforts to educate the legislature on the critical issues facing our industry. 

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) announced Sapna Thottathil will lead the department’s statewide collaboration and coordination to foster sustainable pest management (SPM) across California’s urban, agricultural and wildland settings. Thottathil brings 20 years of experience as a leader in sustainable food and farming, and climate, health and equity program management, policy and research to her role as DPR’s Deputy Director of Sustainable Pest Management.  Prior to joining DPR, Thottathil was Managing Director at the University of California (UC) Center for Climate, Health and Equity, where she oversaw more than 20 research and education programs and facilitated a multi-stakeholder strategic planning process. Previously, she was the Associate Director of Sustainability at the UC Office of the President, where she helped lead a UC Regent-supported task force that developed a statewide IPM policy for UC’s 10 campuses and six health systems. Thottathil was also a leader in a variety of other roles that will advance her collaborative work in addressing the challenges of SPM adoption, including building strategic partnerships and supply chains between institutions like K-12 schools and hospitals and food producers. Earlier in her career, Thottathil was a climate researcher at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research in England and documented on-the-ground organic farming practices in India. She began her career at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as an Environmental Protection Specialist. Thottathil earned a BA in environmental studies and at BA in international studies from the University of Chicago, an MS in environmental change and management from Oxford University, and a PhD in Geography from UC Berkeley.  Thottathil will join the department beginning Sept. 9, 2024.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its final Herbicide Strategy to protect over 900 federally endangered and threatened (listed) species from the potential impacts of herbicides. EPA will use the strategy to identify measures to reduce the amount of herbicides exposure to these species when it registers new herbicides and when it reevaluates registered herbicides under a process called registration review. The final strategy incorporates a wide range of stakeholder input, ensuring EPA not only protects species but also preserves a wide range of pesticides for farmers and growers. The Herbicide Strategy identifies protections for hundreds of listed species up front and will apply to thousands of pesticide products as they go through registration or registration review, thus allowing EPA to protect listed species much faster. In response to comments on the initial draft, EPA made many improvements to the draft, with the primary changes falling into three categories:

1. Making the strategy easier to understand and incorporating up-to-date data and refined analyses;
2. Increasing flexibility for pesticide users to implement mitigation measures in the strategy; and,
3. Reducing the amount of additional mitigation that may be needed when users either have already adopted accepted practices to reduce pesticide runoff or apply herbicides in an area where runoff potential is lower.

The final strategy includes more options for mitigation measures compared to the draft, while still protecting listed species. The strategy also reduces the level of mitigation needed for applicators who have already implemented measures identified in the strategy to reduce pesticide movement from treated fields into habitats through pesticide spray drift and runoff from a field. The measures include cover crops, conservation tillage, windbreaks, and adjuvants. Further, some measures, such as berms, are enough to fully address runoff concerns. Growers who already use those measures will not need any other runoff measures.  The final strategy also recognizes that applicators who work with a runoff/erosion specialist or participate in a conservation program are more likely to effectively implement mitigation measures.  Geographic characteristics may also reduce the level of mitigation needed, such as farming in an area with flat lands, or with minimal rain such as western U.S. counties that are in the driest climates. As a result, in many of those counties, a grower may need to undertake few or no additional runoff mitigations for herbicides that are not very toxic to listed species.  The final strategy uses the most updated information and processes to determine whether an herbicide will impact a listed species and identify protections to address any impacts. To determine impacts, the strategy considers where a species lives, what it needs to survive (for example for food or pollinators), where the pesticide will end up in the environment, and what kind of impacts the pesticide might have if it reaches the species. These refinements allow EPA to focus restrictions only in situations where they are needed.  The final strategy itself does not impose any requirements or restrictions on pesticide use. Rather, EPA will use the strategy to inform mitigations for new active ingredient registrations and registration review of conventional herbicides. EPA is also developing a calculator that applicators can use to help determine what further mitigation measures, if any, they may need to take in light of mitigations they may already have in place.

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) has been sending out notices to applicable vehicle owners, requesting that they register with the new Heavy-Duty Inspection & Maintenance rule.  Any owner/operator of a 14,000 GVWR truck or heavier, must report their equipment into the new database developed by CARB as well as pay a per truck annual compliance fee.  Along with registering, the fleet owner is then required to conduct and submit annual opacity or emission controls inspections done by a 3^rd party in order to obtain the vehicle’s annual registration paperwork.  It was recently noticed to all applicable businesses and vehicle owners that the testing requirement of the rule has been postponed for the 2024 year, and will take effect in 2025.  Currently, CARB is still awaiting an approval waiver from EPA Region 9.  CARB is being challenged on the several of their approved rules, specifically the Advanced Clean Fleets regulation, which pushes businesses to expedite the deployment of electric vehicles within a fleet.  Stay tuned for more updates.

Last week, the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District provided an update on their efforts to implement their PM2.5 State Implementation Plan to meet the National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for the 24-hour standard of 12 ug/m3 for PM_2.5.  In public testimony, Association President/CEO Roger A. Isom urged the Board to reinvigorate the Governing Board’s Study Agency. Isom reminded the board that the Air District achieved the one-hour ozone standard, the PM₁₀ standard and the 65 ug/m3 PM_2.5 standard, based on the results and guidance from all the research that was conducted under the Central California Ozone Study (CCOS) and the California Regional Particulate Matter Air Quality Study  (CRPMAQS), both of which were overseen by the Governing Board’s Study Agency. Isom urged science be the driving factor as the District looks to add new or stricter Conservation Management Practices (CMPs) for farming operations, and to low dust harvesters for tree nut operations. This will become especially important as the District begin looking at the next standard set forth by Federal EPA, which is the 9 ug/m3 PM_2.5 standard.  Governing Board Chairman Vito Chiesa (Stanislaus County Supervisor and walnut grower) wrapped up comments by agreeing with Isom and stating that meeting the new 9 ug/m3 PM_2.5 standard is “going to be very difficult and we’re going to need lots of help like FARMER funding”.  The Association will continue to stay at the forefront of this issue as it does on all regulatory items facing the agricultural industry.

The Association hosted representatives from the California Energy Commission (CEC), California Air Resources Board (CARB), the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District (SJVAPCD) and several agricultural organizations this week to discuss an important survey that will be conducted by Cal Poly San Luis Obispo on potential electrical demand and needs as CARB heads down the path of zero emission mandates on trucks, forklifts, buildings and equipment.  The survey will also give the industry to update the statewide emissions inventory for tractors and harvesters as so much equipment has been replaced or upgraded in the past few years, but the emission inventory doesn’t yet reflect the tremendous strides agriculture has made taking advantage of incentive programs such as the Carl Moyer Program, CARB’s FARMER program or funding through USDA NRCS.  But the primary purpose is to address statewide deficiencies in electric infrastructure and the survey will being to provide glimpse of just how much energy will be needed, where is needed and when will it be needed from an ag perspective.   Cal Poly heard comments from everyone at the meeting and is reworking their draft survey and hope to have some finished and ready to go by September or October.  Agricultural groups participating in the meeting included the California Cotton Ginners and Growers Association, Western Agricultural Processors Association, Ag Energy Consumers Association, California Farm Bureau Federation, California Fresh Fruit Association, Milk Producers Council and the Nisei Farmers League.

Last month, the Cal/OSHA Standards Board approved the new regulation entitled Heat Illness Prevention in Indoor Places of Employment and applies to most indoor workplaces, such as restaurants, warehouses, and manufacturing facilities. For indoor workplaces where the temperature reaches 82 degrees Fahrenheit, employers must take steps to protect workers from heat illness. Some of the requirements include providing water, rest, cool-down areas, and training.   Additional requirements, where feasible, apply where the temperature reaches 87 degrees such as cooling down the work area, implementing work-rest schedules, and providing personal heat-protective equipment.

This week, the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) gave final approval of the regulation, and it is effective immediately.  The Association is working on specific guidance for our member, so be on the lookout for that very soon.  Meanwhile, here is Cal/OSHA’s comparison of the Outdoor and Indoor heat Illness Regulations:

Comparison of Indoor and Outdoor Heat Illness Prevention Standards

The Association hosted California Assembly Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Esmeralda Soria this week for a meeting on current issues and legislation as well as a discussion on key topics for next year’s legislative session.  In attendance were representatives from the California Cotton Ginners and Growers Association, Western Agricultural Processors Association, California Citrus Mutual, California Fresh Fruit Association, Kings County Farm Bureau, Nisei Farmers League, African American Farmers of California, and the Western Plant Health Association.  Topics discussed included water supply needs, the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District’s PM2.5 State Implementation Plan, net energy metering for agricultural solar installations, the Association’s request for an audit of the State Water Resources Control Board’s Waste Discharge Permit Fund (WDPF), migrant housing, Department of Pesticide Regulation’s (DPR) Sustainable Pest Management and Advance Pesticide Application Notification efforts, and CalOSHA’s new Indoor Heat Illness Regulation.