Grower
Survey
|
|
|
|
|
 |
Agricultural Issues and Funding
With assistance from growers and others attending the team building meetings, a survey (see copy enclosed) was developed and mailed to >2,100 vegetable producers in the three states. To encourage farmer response, a cover letter, with either a New York State Vegetable Growers Association, Pennsylvania State University, or Rutgers Cooperative Extension letterhead, was included with each mailed survey. Such letters were signed by a project investigator from Cornell University, Pennsylvania State University, or Rutgers University, as appropriate. Letters directed to NY and PA were also signed by the president of their respective growers association. The goal of the survey was to determine which vegetables are grown in the region, the acreage of each, and the insect, weed, disease, and wildlife pest priorities for at least 34 vegetable crops as determined by growers. The survey also included questions about broad issues that growers faced in their operations, and gave growers an opportunity to indicate where they though funding should be allocated. Respondents were also asked if they considered themselves IPM growers, to provide a definition of IPM and to comment about the survey. Respondents were provided a summary of the survey if they filled in the mailing form at the end of the survey. Summaries were mailed in January of 1997. Respondents were informed that the information they provided would be considered confidential.
The mailing lists for the survey were obtained from the New York State Vegetable Growers Association, the Pennsylvania Vegetable Marketing and Research Program, the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York (NOFA), and a list of New Jersey growers provided by Dr. Don Prostak , Dept. of Entomology at Rutgers University. Although our focus was on diversified fresh market vegetable producers, all recipients of the survey were not necessarily this type of grower. The survey was mailed in March and April of 1996 to 355 New Jersey, 525 New York, and 1255 Pennsylvania farmers.
A total of 421 growers responded to the survey. The total number of acceptable surveys was 349; 40 from New Jersey, 117 from New York, and 192 from Pennsylvania. The total number of acres reported as being farmed by the respondents was 82,988, 1,343 of which were under organic management. Of the total farm acres, 37,684 acres were in vegetable production of which 743 acres were under organic production (46 growers) and 36,941 acres were considered "IPM/conventional" (321 growers). A grower or particular crop on a farm was identified as "organic" if so designated by the respondent. All respondents who did not indicate that they grew organic vegetables were considered "IPM/Conventional" growers. There is some overlap between the two grower types because some growers had both organic and non-organic crops.
Seventy-two surveys were not included in the data summaries because they had only one crop (therefore not diversified) or grew only processing vegetables (not fresh market). Farmers that grew only one fresh market crop were kept in the survey analysis if they had multiple processing vegetables, or if that single crop was considered by us to be a "minor" vegetable, such as tomatoes, pumpkins, muskmelons, cauliflower, peas, celery, asparagus, watermelon, spinach, or sweet potatoes.
The survey listed 35 vegetables for which respondents were asked to list the acreage for each of the vegetables they grew and list the top (up to three) weed, disease, insect and wildlife pests for each crop. In each section, farmers were given the opportunity to write in other crops they grew, or pests they had, that were not listed in the survey. One vegetable, dry beans, was later eliminated from survey analysis because it was considered to be a processing vegetable. The locations from which the surveys were received is shown on maps of the three states (Figs. 1 - 3). The designated areas on the maps represent zip codes. Having the data organized by zip code permits us to associate all the information collected with specific subregions of each state respond to the regional needs accordingly.
Survey data are generally summarized and reported herein first by "all" respondents (IPM/Conventional, Organic and all states combined). The data are subsequently divided by grower type and state.
Table 1 depicts the number of respondents growing each of the over 34 crops, percentage of farms with crop and total acres reported per crop by all respondents. Note that a few "other" crops (not listed in the survey) were added by respondents. Table 2 depicts a ranking of the more than 34 crops by frequency of occurrence for all respondents. Sweet corn and pumpkins are the most commonly grown crops. Additional analyses of these data using crop value per unit area will be conducted; the rankings would no doubt change using this system. Tables 3-7 show these same data, but divided into IPM/Conventional and organic respondents. Sweet corn and pumpkins remain the top two most commonly grown crops for IPM/Conventional (Table 4), but this changes considerably for organic producers. The top two crops for organic growers are potatoes and tomatoes (Table 7). Tables 3 & 6 report the total acreage (sum of all acreages reported by respondents) for each crop under IPM/Conventional and organic production methods.
Tables 8 to 16 show the vegetable crop statistics for each state. Note that because of the limited number of organic respondents, their crop information was not separated by state. All state specific data is for IPM/Conventional growers. When ranked according to how often a vegetable was grown the results varied somewhat among the three states. Peppers, cabbage and sweet corn ranked number one in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, respectively, among IPM/Conventional farms. Tables 10, 13, & 16 rank the total acreage for each IPM/Conventional crop planted in each state. The largest number of acres of a single crop are as follows: New Jersey respondents reported 319 acres in leafy greens, New York respondents reported 3,708 acres in sweet corn, and Pennsylvania respondents reported 1,569 acres of sweet corn.
Although this project focused on "diversified" fresh market vegetable farms, little information on the number of vegetables grown per farm had previously existed. Results showed that individual farms (summarized across all farms) produced from 1 to 33 different vegetables (Fig. 4). Over half of the respondents grew 5 or less crops with the majority growing 2 or 3 fresh market vegetable crops on their farms; most IPM/Conventional farmers grew 1 to 5 fresh market crops (Fig. 5) while organic growers had a relatively even distribution across the whole range crops (Fig. 6). This finding reiterates comments made by IPM/Conventional growers at the Team Building Meetings which addressed the problem of having few chemical sprays that are effective for multiple crops. Given the high cost of chemicals, growers are constrained by the cost of these inputs and may reduce the number of crops that they grow. Because farmers were asked for the acreages of individual vegetable plantings, it was learned that for all respondents, approximately 19% of the fresh market vegetables are grown in plantings of 0.1 acre or less and 25% are grown in plantings of 0.1 to 0.5 acres (Fig. 7). Relatively few plantings exceeded 100 acres. These trends are somewhat similar for just the IPM/Conventional growers (Fig. 8), but for organic growers, small plantings (<0.5 acres) dominate (Fig. 9).
Tables 17a and 17b depict the acreage distributions for plantings of each of the more than 34 crops for all respondents. These data provide very detailed information on the typical size of plantings for each crop and have implications for the practicality of IPM scouting programs. Note that sweet corn is planted in fields ranging from 0.1 acre to 1500, whereas asparagus is most often grown in plantings of one acre or less. No doubt many of these crops are planted in units smaller than 0.1 acre, but, for sake of simplicity, the survey requested that acreages be reported in increments of 0.1 acre. Tables 18 and 19 show acreage distributions separated by IPM/Conventional and organic vegetable plantings, respectively.
The information on acreage distribution per planting and the number of vegetables grown per farm depict the complexities involved in the fresh market vegetable farming system. In addition to vegetables, many of these farms also had field crops, fruit, greenhouse units, etc. All of this has implications for the development and adoption of practical and economical IPM practices.
The survey also generated a substantial amount of information on grower identified weed, disease, insect and wildlife pests for each of the over 34 vegetables. Detailed listings of pest priorities for these vegetables for IPM/Conventional and organic producers are shown in Tables 20-23 and 24-27, respectively. In these and all subsequent pest priority tables, farmer "write-ins" (other crops and pests) are separated from the rest of the data by double lines. Examples of pest information generated by the survey and depicted in Table 18 to 25 include the percentage of farms reporting pests on crops. For example, of the 41 IPM/Conventional asparagus growers, 7.3% reported disease to be a problem on asparagus vs. 76% (69 of 91 growers) of the respondents reported diseases as a problem on potatoes (Tables 20a & 20b). Likewise, 87.8% of the respondents reported insects as a problem on asparagus vs. 98.9% on potato (Tables 21a & 21b). This information is further broken by each disease, insect, weed and wildlife pest. For example, cucumber beetles are considered the most important insect pests on cucumbers, muskmelon, pumpkins and squash (Tables 21a & 21b). The pest priorities of IPM/Conventional growers can be compared with those of organic growers. For a variety of reasons, pest priorities of organic growers vary to some extent from IPM/Conventional growers. There exist a few obvious errors in the pest data. For example cucumber beetles are not a pest of potatoes, yet a small percentage (3.3%) of growers (Table 21b) indicated that they were pests. In general these "errors" do not constitute a major concern to data analyses because they are infrequent. They do however indicate a need for educational efforts in pest identification.
Table 28 provides a summary of pest priority for eight crops for all respondents. Growers listed redroot pigweed and lambsquarters as their top two weed pests. Woodchuck and deer were considered the top wildlife pests. Disease and insect pests were more crop specific. These data have been further subdivided by state (Tables 29-40) and could be divided by regions within state (based on zip code areas). This will permit a detailed assessment of grower needs by state and region within state. The lists of grower identified pest problems offer both opportunities for future research as well as opportunities for further grower education through field days, fact sheets, and other extension educational activities.
In the survey, growers were also asked general questions about agricultural issues important to farming. Issues included land costs, marketing, relations with the public, urban encroachment, regulations and labor. IPM/Conventional farmers (all states combined) rated regulations, labor, relations with the public, and land costs as important issues in that order (Fig. 10). Organic growers rated the important issues somewhat differently; labor and marketing were followed by relations with the public and land costs (Fig. 11). Within each state farmers rated regulations and labor as being the first and second most important; however, land costs were far less important to respondents in New Jersey than in New York and Pennsylvania (Figs. 12-14). Understanding and appreciating these, often times overriding, grower concerns puts IPM in the proper perspective.
Growers were also given the opportunity to prioritize agricultural funding among the following categories: development of more and better chemical controls, development of non-chemical controls, fostering private consultants, development of computer technologies for use on the farm, development of treatment guidelines and for educational materials on pests and natural enemies. Growers could prioritize their funding amongst weeds, disease, insects and animals or across all of these categories. Fig. 15 summarizes some of the information learned regarding funding priorities. In general, respondents considered funding for the development of non-chemical controls to be somewhat more important than funding for chemical control tactics. Funding for more consultants and computer technology was considered less important than other options. When broken out by pest type, funding for IPM tactics for wildlife was considered less important than the others. More specific information on rankings by grower type and state are depicted in Figs. 16-45. There are some very distinct differences in funding priorities between IPM/Conventional and organic growers.
In addition, the survey asked farmers, "Do you consider yourself an IPM farmer?" Of those that answered the question, 216 said "Yes" and 79 said "No", leaving 54 who either didn't answer or checked both responses. Organic growers indicated either response depending on whether they felt IPM included organic practices, or just better use of chemicals. When asked "What does 'IPM' mean to you?" responses varied both in detail and understanding. In most cases, growers listed common attributes of IPM such as scouting, use of thresholds, planting resistant varieties, lower inputs, etc. Almost twice as many organic growers as IPM/Conventional growers indicated both non-chemical and environmentally-sound practices as being important, many stressing that IPM is not chemical management, but rather long-term, whole-farm management. Some growers thought IPM was worthless, risky, or too difficult to implement, or that it was merely good public relations geared to consumers worried about pesticides. Unfortunately, this open-ended question left for some ambiguity in the answers.
With few exceptions the survey respondents were complimentary of the survey and thought it valuable. Some comments taken directly from the survey are presented in Table 41.
|
Previous Page: |
Next Page: |
IPM for Diversified Fresh Market Vegetables, Table of Contents
Index of Northeast Region Phase I Projects