Fellow Growers,
As the General Manager of our family owned farm it is extremely rare that I find myself on the tractor seat any longer. I spend my day insuring that all of the components of our business are running properly and moreover, that we are in compliance with a myriad of regulations, including local, county, state, and federal, that must be adhered to in order to operate a legitimate and legal business here in New Jersey. I was trained and schooled in Horticulture, yet our 300 acres of conventional, sustainable, and certified organic production demand that I run the business from my desk and my pick up seat. I certainly enjoy and value the interaction about growing apples; but equally value the networking that occurs on this site related to running a profitable commercial farm operation this day and age.which for better or worse includes politics. If you really want to try to rationalize our federal government.I would suggest that you start with the new H2A adverse wage rates just released from Washington D.C. New Jersey farm worker rates went from $9.74 to $10.60.nearly a 10% increase. How can they legitimize these rates in an environment of relative 0% inflation and an excess domestic work force. Moreover, the new rules require us to pay all other workers doing similar work who are non H2A the same wages. The federal government has just added a $50,000 expense to our business this year.is this what they consider to be business friendly? We made a very deliberate decision to switch to H2A several years ago so that we would have a fully documented work force that was beyond reproach.but it has cost as an enormous amount of money to do so. May you all be blessed with an abundant crop and good prices this season! Best Regards, Kurt W. Alstede General Manager Alstede Farms, LLC 84 County Rt. 513 (Old Rt. 24) Post Office Box 278 Chester, New Jersey 07930 United States of America Tel.: 908-879-7189 Fax: 908-879-7815 www.alstedefarms.com From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Fleming, William Sent: Monday, March 14, 2011 6:32 PM To: Apple-crop discussion list Subject: Re: [apple-crop] apples- not propaganda Seems like nowadays half the job of farming is political be it water, pesticides, zoning, etc. In order to retain our agricultural way of life we have to band together politically and lobby for what will keep us in business. Unfortunate but unavoidable. Bill Fleming Montana State University Western Ag Research Center 580 Quast Ln Corvallis, Montana _____ From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of David Doud Sent: Monday, March 14, 2011 4:26 PM To: Apple-crop discussion list Subject: Re: [apple-crop] apples- not propaganda "I want info about apples," then contribute something - for the record, I'm fine with the discussion going on - happy to see activity - D grower-indiana On Mar 14, 2011, at 5:10 PM, Dennis Brackman wrote: I want info about apples, not political chatter - please remove me from your e-mail list. tgith _______________________________________________ apple-crop mailing list [email protected] http://virtualorchard.net/mailman/listinfo/apple-crop
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