Wisconsin flooding may mean pricier organic foods

Tag : farm fences

The floods that damaged his and other farms in southern Wisconsinearlier this month are likely to result in fewer fruits andvegetables at regionalfarmers markets this summer and will boostalready high prices for organic eggs and meat at national grocerystores in the fall.

A cool spring meant many farmers were about two weeks behind inplanting. The storms struck just as their first vegetables emergedfrom the ground.

"Twelve inches of water falling on, say, this field of beets thatwere just starting to peak through the soil, it just washed themaway," de Wilde said. "They couldn't withstand that kind ofdeluge."

Organic corn fed to livestock that provide organic eggs, chicken,beef and pork was barely 4 inches high, half of what it should havebeen, said Eric Newman, vice president of sales for La Farge,Wis.-based Organic Valley, the nation's largest cooperative oforganic farmers.

Now, it's too late in the season to replant, which means feed islikely to be in shorter supply and more expensive in the fall, whenfarmers in cold states such as Wisconsin stop grazing theiranimals. Newman predicted the cooperative will have to raise eggand dairy prices accordingly.

"Unless we pay them more, they can't afford to purchase that feed,"he said.
The one area where consumers aren't likely to see a shortage orhigher prices is in organic produce sold by large grocers, such asWhole Foods. California supplies over half of the nation's organicfruits and vegetables and should be able to make up for losses inWisconsin and other flooded states, Newman said.

That could hurt farms like Driftless Organics in Soldiers Grove,Wis. After flooding last August, farm owners Josh and Noah Engeland manager Mike Lind planted early vegetables such as peas andbeans in a field that had dried out well. That land got floodedthis month.

Now, they're scrambling to get spinach and other fast-growingplants into the ground. About half of their business is wholesale,but Lind said they can't look to grocers to pay more to cover thecost of replanting.
"I think the local food scene is in such its infancy right now,that any outlet that does carry our produce has so many connectionswith California growers that they could easily make up for what weproduce," he said.
Instead, farms like Driftless Organics and de Wilde's farm arebanking on their community-supported agriculture programs, in whichpeople pay for a share of their harvest up front. CSA members getmore produce in good years and less in times of drought or flood.

Many CSA members support farms in other ways as well. For example,de Wilde's members donated $52,000 to help him rebuild afterAugust's flood. In comparison, his federal insurance paid $23,000.

Unlike farmers who grow corn, wheat and other commodities, mostvegetable farmers don't have any crop insurance because theprograms set up for them are difficult to enroll in and payrelatively little, said Laura Paine, an organic agriculturespecialist for the state Department of Agriculture, Trade andConsumer Protection.

Still, she said farmers like de Wilde are relatively lucky becausethey can replant and salvage part of the growing season.
That's not the case for muck farmers, who plant in nutrient-richsoil in low areas drained by ditches. Some muck farms in southernWisconsin's Columbia, Adams and Jefferson still have many acresunder water, Paine said.

They also tend to plant one or two vegetables, often carrots andonions, in the spring for sale to organic food processors in thefall. "Those folks have basically lost their crops for the year,"Paine said.