Crop Protection
Crop protection is a vital part of any farming system. Pests must be controlled, beneficial animals encouraged, soil vitality and plant health maintained all the while ensuring that there is no detrimental impact on surrounding environments. To effectively meet these ends Western Growers members typically employ an integrated approach that includes the wise use of cultural, biological, and chemical means to produce the highest quality, safest fresh fruits, nuts and vegetables in the world.
These web pages, links and resources have been developed in an attempt to help Western Growers members and others stay abreast of the science and technology that we will need to continue to feed a growing population on a fixed or diminishing supply of arable land.
Most of the information focuses on issues impacting the availability of key crop protection tools and technologies both today and in the future. These tools and technologies may include pesticides, fertilizers, plant varieties as well as other crop protection strategies that have been approved or are being considered for both conventional and organic farming systems. As always, we greatly appreciate feedback from members and other interested parties on how Western Growers might make these pages most useful.
Western Growers still needs assistance on developing feedback to the United States Environmental Protection Agency on the importance of chloropicrin to California and Arizona agriculture. The USEPA
announced in late November the availability of their current risk assessment
for the fumigant chloropicrin and opened a public comment period to receive
feedback and inform decisions on risk management and eligibility for continued
registration of chloropicrin. After requests from Western Growers and other
organizations, a 30-day extension was granted extending the comment period
through February 28, 2007.
USDA and USEPA have encouraged organizations such as Western Growers to compile
information on behalf of their members and submit this information to them as a
package. Western Growers is working with other organizations to compile as much
information on critical uses as possible and we need your help to do this. If
you rely on chloropicrin as an important part of your pest management program
please complete the attached survey on specific use practices and return it to
WG via fax at (949) 809- 6205. We specifically need information on uses in
lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, and celery crops. The survey is available
on Western Growers web site here or you can access it directly by clicking here: Survey
For more information access the Federal Register Docket here and select Environmental Protection Agency in the “Agency” dropdown
box and type in EPA-HQ-OPP-2006-0661 in the “Keyword or ID” box or
contact WG’s Hank Giclas (hgiclas@wga.com)
at (949) 885-2205.
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