Spring seeding leaps ahead; the census and agriculture
Washington Ag Today March 30, 2010 The pace of spring cereal seeding in Washington surged forward this past week due to dry conditions. The Washington Field Office of the National Agricultural Statistics Service reports that half the state’s spring wheat crop had been planted at the start of this week. That’s double the five year average for now. Spring barley seeding at 38 percent complete is more than twice the five year average for this time. Fifteen percent of Washington’s potato crop has been planted. That pace is also well ahead of normal. There was just a Census of Agriculture a couple of years ago so how important to agriculture is the regular national census this is going on now? Cynthia Clark runs USDA’s Statistics Service and she says it is extra important for everyone in rural areas to fill out the census form and send it back since federal funds and programs for things like schools, roads, farms, are allocated partly by population. Clark: “And if we don’t participate in the census we won‘t have an accurate count of populations in the rural areas and then we will not be appropriately allocating funds to those areas.” And of course population also determines representation in Congress. Cooperatives Working Together, or CWT, accepted four bids from Darigold and two bids from Foremost Farms for export assistance for a total of 959 metric tons (2.1 million pounds) of Cheddar cheese to the Middle East. CWT reactivated the Export Assistance program to address low producer milk prices. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s Washington Ag Today on the Northwest Ag Information Network. ? ? ? ?
