CFAP Deadline Pt 2

CFAP Deadline Pt 2

Bob Larson
Bob Larson
With today’s Fruit Grower Report, I’m Bob Larson. After an update to the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program, more commodities now qualify for financial relief from the impact of the pandemic.

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BL: Welcome back to another “Fruit Bites” brought to you by Valent U.S.A. With us again is Valent’s Allison Walston. And this week Allison, let’s talk about ReTain PGR and if you were only going to apply it once, when would you apply and why.

AW: The plant growth regulator, ReTain, is a bit of a “choose your own adventure” type of product, because ReTain blocks the ethylene pathway and ethylene is present at many different times during the apple or pear’s lifecycle. But, if you are only planning to apply ReTain once to your crop, I would suggest 7 days before harvest.

BL: And this will help their color?

At this time, for apples, the color has mostly developed so there won’t be any color drag, the apples are readily maturing, so ReTain would shut ethylene down for 2nd & 3rd picks to grow larger, stay firm and stop ripening. This would also lessen greasiness. For both apples and pears, we see a reduction in storage disorders and most importantly we see stop-drop or a decrease in the fruit dropped from the tree.

BL: Well, thanks Allison. Join us again next time for Fruit Bites, brought to you by Valent. Until then, I’m Bob Larson.

Senator Judy Warnick says that’s great news, but with the deadline to file for aid coming up on August 28th, farmers get online soon to check it out …

WARNICK … “I was looking to see what is out there. I went into some of those links and it’s a little bit complicated, but they do break it down into categories.”So, who qualifies? …

WARNICK … “Primarily, if you lost more than 5% in your price for your crop you should be eligible, if the crop is listed. And, there are a number of crops that Washington covers so it, hopefully, if you’re a farmer in Washington state, you can qualify for that.”

Warnick says the USDA is trying to make it as simple as possible …

WARNICK … “I think what Sonny Perdue and his agency is trying to do is there trying to help as many farmers as possible.”

The changes, Warnick says correct the earlier version that was rushed …

WARNICK … “You know, if they looked, if people looked at this early on, say in May or June, they may have been disappointed, but now, as of July 13th, according to this release that we sent out, as of July 13th, there’s more crops available, more commodities.”

Go to https://www.farmers.gov/cfap for more information or to see if you qualify.

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