Focus on Ag June 2020

JUNE 2020

Monterey County infection rates highest in ag Strawberry industry settles after hectic start Garlic production kicks off in Gilroy A PUBLICATION OF

Gilroy Dispatch | Hollister Free Lance King City Rustler | Salinas Valley Tribune | Watsonville Pajaronian

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FOCUS ON AGRICULTURE

JUNE 2020

MONTEREY COUNTY

Covid-19 infection rates highest in ag workers MUNICIPALITIES, AGENCIES WORK TO CONTAIN CASES IN AGRICULTURE WORKERS

By SEAN RONEY

M

Sean Roney

onterey County Health Department reports that 475 agriculture workers, or 36.79% of the county’s total confirmed cases, have been infected with Covid-19 as of June 22.

A large gap separates that figure and the 261 “unknown or under investigation” category, and another almost-halved gap separates from the third most-infected category, 134 retired or unemployed. The next employment-related category, educational and childcare, totals 108 cases, or 8.37% of total confirmed cases.

Local municipalities have released bilingual preventative recommendations through videos, posts and informational fliers in an effort to reduce the infection rate, and Natividad Medical Center in Salinas issued public service announcements in multiple languages, including Triqui and Mixteco.

However, proactive informational efforts toward agricultural workers have not visibly reduced their significant portion of cases.

“We continue to look at what appears to be disproportionate representation of Covid-19 among the Latino population and

agricultural workers,” said Dr. Edward Moreno, the county’s health officer, in a press briefing June 19.

“We in public health have and continue to work with people who have Covid-19 who admit that they’re ag workers, too,” Moreno said.

He said the county’s caseworkers identify such individuals and help them get “to a place where they can isolate and take care of themselves and not expose additional people,” in case an ag worker’s living conditions prevent them from isolating from roommates or family.

This has included the setup of Alternate Housing Sites in King City and Monterey, with the San Lorenzo Park site in King City hosting 10 trailers, each capable of housing seven people. As of June 19, there were no residents assigned to shelter in those quarantined sites.

The county has isolated such persons through a partnership with the Grower-Shipper Association of Central California. The county, however, specified less than 5% of cases are referred to that program, which also doesn’t ask for occupation information.

“We have worked with some of our local hospitals to specifically get testing more accessible to our

PRECAUTIONS Agriculture workers in Greenfield spread out

in order to reduce the infection risk of Covid-19. farmworker community,” Moreno said about ongoing efforts.

The question of workplace contamination has remained a concern, as agricultural labor commonly has groups of workers close together either in the rows of crops or packed onto machines.

“There is no 5 feet, 6 feet distance when you’re riding a bus of 50 or more,” said Margarita Lopez during a March city council meeting in King City, warning of the continued risk to laborers caused by busing. She noted the education, responsibility and

liability needed to be with the employers.

As weeks of shelterin-place orders stretched on into months, numerous reports of seeing ag workers packed into buses continued.

“The ag commissioner has issued updated guidance for employers of workers in the ag industry and also provided for measures and strategies to promote physical distancing,” Moreno said of the county’s involvement in the industry.

If employees feel their employer is putting them at risk for Covid-19

infection through unsafe practices or by ignoring protocols and guidelines, they can seek help through multiple avenues.

“In a pandemic, employees can certainly call our Covid telephone number and report with or without providing their name, the working conditions,” Moreno said. “The ag commissioner is primarily responsible for providing oversight for use of pesticides, and is another avenue that workers could access to complain about working conditions.”

He added that those workplace protections

could fall within the commissioner’s scope.

“Even outside of a pandemic, workers and anyone for that matter, can also voice concerns about work conditions to Cal/OSHA, who has the responsibility statewide for putting standards for employers for the purposes of protecting workers in California,” Moreno said.

The county’s Health Department Hotline is 831-769-8700 or 831755-4521. Cal/OSHA’s contact number is 1-800-963-9424.

GILROY

Garlic production kicks off at Christopher Ranch RANCH AIMS TO ALLEVIATE NATIONWIDE SHORTAGE

By ERIK CHALHOUB

Gilroy’s Christopher Ranch kicked off its garlic harvest season in early June, and the 100 million pounds of its Californiagrown product will soon provide relief for grocers stricken by a nationwide shortage of the bulb.

But is the monthslong shortage finally at an end? Probably not, said Ken Christopher, executive vice president of Christopher Ranch.

“In the short, medium

and long term, I would probably say ‘no,’” Christopher said.

“I expect demand for fresh California garlic to remain very, very high.”

Christopher pointed to decisions made in June 2019 that resulted in the shortage. At that time, President Donald Trump approved an increase in tariffs from 10% to 25% on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods, including garlic.

Since 2001, the Government Accountability Office has attributed more than $600 million in financial damages to the U.S. garlic industry from “illegal dumping” of Chinese garlic. Chinese exporters

have flooded the U.S. market with cheap produce, Christopher said, and sell their products well below the cost of production.

As a result, Chinese garlic costs about $25 a box, compared to roughly $60 a box for Californiagrown garlic.

In July 2019, the U.S. Department of Commerce blocked Shijiazhuang Goodman Trading Company of China from shipping garlic into the country, citing illegal “dumping” of the product, Christopher said.

While a boon for the remaining three major United States-based garlic farms, keeping up with the explosion in

CLARK TRUCKING

demand proved to be a difficult task.

Then, Covid-19 and the ensuing shelter-inplace orders hit. While the demand from restaurants nearly disappeared, it all shifted to consumers at home, whose pandemicinduced shopping frenzy of health-based products cleared store shelves nationwide.

Health officials have stressed that garlic does not “cure” the novel coronavirus, but it can provide other health benefits such as boosting the immune system.

“The demand for garlic nationwide went stratospheric,” Christopher said, adding that it’s “been a bit of a nightmare” over the past three months.

831-385-3204 100 AIRPORT DRIVE KING CITY, CA

To keep up with production, the ranch has added an additional shift with 60 new employees, according to Christopher.

Christopher Ranch has also furthered its safety measures, he said, such as mandatory temperature checks for its 1,000 employees, face masks and hand sanitizer stations, as well as eliminating facility tours. To date, no employees have contracted Covid-19, Christopher said.

“It’s been a hard few months, so it’s nice to be able to talk about something so positive,” he said. “It’s looking beautiful. It’s a point of pride that we get to bring it back out to the world.”

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Christopher Ranch was forced to import garlic from Latin American countries such as Argentina and Mexico to meet the demand, Christopher said.

As a result, shoppers found garlic of all different sizes and of all different qualities, and that’s if they were lucky enough to even find the bulb in stores.

“Our fans are crying out that they need product,” Christopher said.

The 100 million pounds of garlic this season is about a 10% increase over the previous year, according to Christopher, as the ranch planned for the rise in demand due to the tariffs.

But of course, it didn’t expect a pandemic, he added.

Southern California apron manufacturer Hedley and Bennet is donating 40,000 masks to Central Coast farmworkers thanks to the efforts of Dr. Anne Irvine, a resident at UCSF Natividad Family Medicine Residency, who has been working to reduce Covid-19 illness among laborers.

Irvine reached out to Hedley and Bennett, which has pivoted to make masks, and asked for a donation.

“We are so proud and honored to be able to provide masks for all the farmworkers in Monterey

and Santa Cruz counties,” said Ellen Bennett, CEO and Founder of Hedley and Bennett. “As a company that was born in a kitchen and started out making aprons for chefs, we’ve been dedicated to the culinary world from the beginning, and it means so much to us to be able to give back to workers who are so critical to our food system and yet so vulnerable in this moment.”

Irvine is partnering with Project PPE for the Central Coast (PPE4CC), the Center for Community Advocacy (CCA), California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA),

the United Farm Workers (UFW) and Lideres Campesinas to distribute the face masks to workers from Watsonville to King City.

Infographics on safely taking masks on and off and how to care for them, plus guidance on best practices to protect the community by incorporating face coverings, hand hygiene, physical distancing and staying in place when possible will also be included due to the generosity of Dina Clark Design and Community Printers. ➝ See MASKS, page 3

JUNE 2020

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FOCUS ON AGRICULTURE

PAJARO VALLEY

Strawberry industry settles after hectic start to season

By JOHANNA MILLER

MASKS ➝ From page 2

“When Covid began to affect us all, I saw [farmworkers] need for PPE as essential workers, and the lack of resources

[weather] interruptions like last year’s late rain storms. The strawberries [in the Pajaro Valley] are healthy… we’re having ideal weather, with cool mornings and sunny afternoons.”

Looking ahead, Bjorn said that labor is one factor that will be challenging in the coming months.

While many have joined the agriculture industry in light of losing other jobs, workers’ situations remain uncertain.

“Our biggest challenge right now is the future of schools,” Bjorn said. “If distance learning is going to be a full school year… that will be a big burden for our working parents.”

Safety is also a concern, said O’Donnell, who listed the ways in which the Strawberry Commission has been reaching out to growers with information on how to stop the spread of Covid-19.

“Things are changing all the time,” she said.

“There is new information to report every day. We are trying to find ways to train our growers and our crews for these issues.”

For information visit calstrawberry.com/en-us.

RIPE PICKING Strawberries are thriving this year, and production

available,” Irvine said.

A collaborative to specifically address the unique conditions of agriculture, including representatives from farmworker organizations, governmental agencies, healthcare organizations,

academic centers, advocacy groups and growers and shippers, had already begun to address these issues when the migration of labor from Southern California to the Central Coast began for spring harvest a few weeks ago and an

outbreak occurred among farmworkers.

Coordination between these groups is unprecedented and a united public health response will be crucial to the health of the entire community, organizers say.

Other strategies

Johanna Miller

Strawberry season in the Pajaro Valley is in full swing, and experts are reporting that demand has steadily increased despite a difficult kickoff.

As the Covid19 pandemic hit the California region in mid-March, strawberry producers initially saw a spike in sales. But it was soon followed by an alarming drop in production as the food supply chain began to break down.

“We were backlogged,” said Soren Bjorn, President of Driscoll’s of the Americas. “We sat on extra berries for days.

At one point in April… we [lost] about 15 trucks to processing. That was devastating.”

Bjorn said it was likely due to the fact that berries are highly perishable, and during the first month or so of the shelter-inplace order, consumers were more inclined to buy longer-lasting foods.

In addition, lucrative places that once sourced Driscoll’s berries—theme parks, airlines, cruise ships—could no longer operate.

Carolyn O’Donnell, Communications Director for the California Strawberry Commission, said that about 15 to 20% of California’s strawberries are purchased by foodservice industries, which also took a hit during shelter-in-place.

“It was a pretty hectic first couple of months,” O’Donnell said. “There was a significant drop.

Schools and restaurants were closed. For some growers… especially smaller [growers], losing that was a major hit.”

Bjorn said that Driscoll’s found themselves having to make up for the losses through grocery stores and online sales.

“We are still having a hard time with that recovery,” he said.

However, O’Donnell said that things are leveling out, and demand is once again high. This has been helped out by the fact that the crops themselves are doing well—especially for current crops in the Pajaro Valley.

“The fruit has been great,” O’Donnell said.

“We are right in the zone for production.”

Added Bjorn: “There have been no major

is looking up despite Covid-19 market disruptions.

addressing case tracing, testing, isolation and quarantine are already being implemented to complement the modified stay-at-home orders and protections for essential workers.

“The current Covid19 outbreak in Monterey

County is significant and warrants immediate action,” said Dr. Catherine Sonquist Forest, founder of Project PPE for the Central Coast, which evolved to address the emerging shortages of PPE throughout the Central Coast region.

*Cover photography by Tarmo Hannula

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JUNE 2020

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