CO Fruit and Vegetable Growers Assn President Advocates on Behalf of Members

CO Fruit and Vegetable Growers Assn President Advocates on Behalf of Members

Last week Colorado Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association President Robert Sakata was in Washington D.C. meeting with elected officials and government agency representatives on issues critical to Colorado produce growers’ success. He participate din the Western Growers national legislative event. Sakata shares more about the priorities of their legislative visits.
Sakata: “We met with 25 elected officials — both congressmen and senators — and then also numerous agencies people and also had briefings on other topics as well. Of course for us in the arid West — and really for all fruits and vegetable growers across the United States — the number one concern is finding enough qualified help to help us on the farm. So we talked about the H2A program and the challenges people are acting with that. And the possibility of passing legislation to start a whole new, different more workable guest worker program for agriculture. Water was the second thing on the agenda to really talk about. Southern California is still facing drought conditions and here in Colorado it year-to-year — we never know what is going to happen. We talked about how we can better manage the limited water resources that we have. Whether it is development of new water storage or different management techniques or improving aging infrastructure. The third thing was the myriad of new regulations falling on fruit and vegetable farmers across the U.S.”
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