By LINDA McGURK
Indiana Correspondent

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A USDA pilot project will allow farmers in seven Midwest states to grow selected vegetables for processing on base acres enrolled in the Direct and Counter-Cyclical Program, without penalty.

That could be a big boon both to growers and processing companies, which saw the old rules as a threat to the long-term viability of the industry. “We’ve been pushing really hard for this. The growers led the way and we supported that,” said Steve Smith, director of agriculture at Elwood, Ind.-based tomato processor Red Gold.

The Planting Transferability Pilot Project (PTPP) was authorized by the 2008 farm bill and pertains to cucumbers, green peas, lima beans, pumpkins, snap beans, sweet corn and tomatoes, but doesn’t include vegetables grown for the fresh market. Growers in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin will be able to participate.

For each base acre planted with an approved vegetable, base-acre payments on that farm will be temporarily reduced on an acre-for-acre basis. Each state has been allotted a certain number of acres, ranging from 1,000 for Iowa to 34,000 for Minnesota.

“It will be a big benefit for the producers who are growing for Red Gold – they’ve really been the biggest participant in this,” said Marietta Kendall, agriculture program specialist with the Indiana Farm Service Agency (FSA). “It will help growers rotate different acres for pest and disease management.”

Indiana has been allotted 9,000 acres, and Kendall did not expect applications to exceed that number. In 2007 Indiana growers harvested 8,400 acres of tomatoes for processing and 1,700 acres for the fresh market.

Until now, base acres – which are reserved for corn, wheat and soybeans – have been off-limits for vegetable production and only producers with a history of growing vegetables have been able to do so without facing penalties. In many cases, the production history of the farm has been tied to one person and couldn’t be passed on from one generation to the next, or from one spouse to the other. That made it difficult for existing vegetable growers to expand or rotate crops, and for new growers to get into the business. “We were faced with a long-term crisis,” Smith said. “This at least gives us temporary relief. If we’re going to compete with California, we have to be able to source products.”

For Red Gold, the pilot project couldn’t be launched soon enough, since the company kept losing growers due to the “egregious nature” of the old rules, Smith said.

“We’re processing at capacity right now and we don’t want to lose any growers. In the future, if we want to increase our market share we’d love to see more (tomatoes) grown in (Indiana),” he said.
“This new bill has caused a lot of people who couldn’t even consider growing vegetables to be in contact with us, and we did take on one new grower because of it.”

Indiana U.S. Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Dist. 8), a member of the House Agriculture Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities and Risk Management, and Rep. Joe Donnelly (D-Dist. 2) of the House Ag Committee were instrumental in getting the measure passed.

“This was an idea that was presented to me by Indiana farmers who kept running into unnecessary government red tape over their crop rotations,” Ellsworth said.

“When we first started this process, the program repealed planting restrictions solely in Indiana.

“The fact that it evolved to include 75,000 acres across the Midwest shows that there is support in Congress for providing farmers – not just in Indiana, but across the country – with more flexibility. I support that goal and see this as a step in the right direction.”

He added a more diversified crop production will strengthen the agriculture industry in Indiana. “Farmers will make up their own minds about which crops they want to plant, but the government should not discourage crop diversification through burdensome and unnecessary regulations,” he said.

The PTPP will be available each year and eligible participants may apply by completing form CCC-749 available at www.fsa.usda.gov and filing it with their county FSA office.

Applicants need to provide a copy of the contract between the producer and processing plant, and must agree to produce the crop as part of a program of crop rotation on the farm to achieve agronomic, pest and disease management benefits, according to the USDA.

The signup period for the PTPP started Feb. 3 and will end March 2; the USDA will not accept applications filed after that date.