Census Of Ag & Crop Assistance

Census Of Ag & Crop Assistance plus Food Forethought. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.

USDA has announced Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program assistance for losses to bush or tree fruit crops due to frost or freeze during the 2012 crop year. The program, authorized by the 2014 Farm Bill, provides supplemental NAP payment to eligible producers. Farmers who did not have access to crop insurance and are in primary and adjacent counties that received a Secretarial disaster designation because of frost or freeze in 2012 are eligible for NAP assistance. Losses due to weather damage or other adverse natural occurrences may also qualify for program assistance. Sign up begins today and applications must be submitted by Sept. 22, 2014.

National Agricultural Statistics Service Administrator Joe Reilly has a look at some of the facts pertaining to grape and almond production from the 2012 Census of Ag.

REILLY: California is the big production state in grape production across the country and the number of acres in grape production was up 8% from 2007.Almond production was close to 936-thousand acres up 34% from 10 years ago.

Now with today's Food Forethought, here's Lacy Gray.

While shopping for groceries the other day my hubby commented on a slight imperfection on one of the red peppers within a carton of several and started to replace that carton in search of one with more "perfect looking" peppers. I convinced him that we could use that pepper first and that the small amount lost to the blemished area would be insignificant. Too often we want inexpensive yet "perfect" food. You can't visit a grocery store nowadays without hearing at least one customer complaining about the rising cost of food. Thankfully most consumers realize that it is not the farmers who are to blame for rising food costs. It is due to a combination of skyrocketing energy costs, increasingly restrictive federal and state regulations imposed on producers regarding the use of fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides and even water, as well as unpredictable challenges due to ever changing weather patterns that can reduce an abundant crop to rubble in a matter of minutes. Strangely, amidst all of our complaining and gnashing of teeth over rising food costs we still spend less of our paychecks on food than any other country in the world.

Thanks Lacy. That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.