ACRE Announced & Fmr Ag Secretary Busy

ACRE Announced & Fmr Ag Secretary Busy plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

It’s official! Beginning April 27th and continuing through August 14th producers can elect and enroll in the Average Crop Revenue Election program. Producers who elect the ACRE program for a farm agree to forgo counter-cyclical payments; accept a 20-percent reduction of the direct payments; and accept a 30-percent reduction in loan rates for all commodities produced on the farm. Producers may elect and enroll in ACRE for the 2009 crop year even if they have already accepted advance direct payments under the Direct and Counter-cyclical Program.

Former Ag Secretary Ed Schafer has been keeping busy since leaving office. He has had numerous offers and opportunities but he has been keeping his fingers in the mix and has been visiting with biofuels companies about potential involvement.

SCHAFER: This has the chance to change the rural fabric of America. If we could convert about 1-billion barrels of oil to biofuels it would double farm income in this country. I hope to remain actively involved in the development of public policy that will pursue biofuel development.

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

Would you like paper or plastic is a question most of us are familiar with in the grocery store check-out line, but that question is now being tossed around by dairy producers. It’s come to their attention that kids don’t care for the taste of wax they get from those little waxed board cartons that school milk is served in; they prefer plastic re-sealable milk containers. As a child in school I used to ask for a glass for my milk; of course this didn’t go over well, and I was shooed on my merry little way while the other kids rolled their eyes. Little did I know, I was just ahead of my time. Kids now days are not shy about what they like or don’t like, and the grownups are listening. In California they have started a “New Look of School Milk” campaign. Kids also sited that with the re-sealable plastic milk containers they can take their milk with them and finish it later; something that is really hard, if not impossible to do with the standard wax containers. I’ll have my milk, without wax please.

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