At least 600 Wildfires continue to burn throughout California as I write and file this column in late August.
The wildfires, most caused by lightning strikes, have so far burned over 1 million acres — and that’s in just a little over one week’s time. And unfortunately, there’s a long way to go before the fires are even close to being contained. So far, most of the wildfires are at only a 5 percent – 10 percent containment level, according to CAL FIRE (California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection).
The wildfires couldn’t come at a worse time for agriculture because a myriad of crops, including almonds, berries, stone fruits, melons, various types of vegetables and more, are harvested in California in August and September. These crops require workers to pick them — either by hand or to operate picking machinery — which is a difficult enough job to do in normal circumstances.
The circumstances due to the wildfires are far from normal though because toxic smoke fills the air. Northern California, where most of the wildfires are located, has the worse air quality in the world right now due to the smoke from the fires, according to Utah-based Purple Air, which tracks and maps air quality globally.
The wildfires also come at a time when the coronavirus pandemic continues unabated in the state, as both deaths from Covid-19 and the numbers of new cases reported continue to set daily records. When you add the continued threat of contracting Covid-19 to the threat from the smoke from the wildfires, it becomes an extremely dangerous situation for farmworker health and safety.
Despite the dual dangers of breathing toxic smoke and contracting Covid-19 — experts warn that breathing the smoke can cause upper-respiratory problems that will make Covid-19 worse — farmworkers in California remain out in the fields harvesting crops in order to bring food to our tables.
In the Napa and Sonoma region in Northern California the LNU Lighting Complex Fires, which have already resulted in the evacuation of thousands of people, are affecting agricultural workers who are still out in the fields working despite the horrible air quality.
The fires also are impacting a significant amount of agricultural land in the region, where harvest is in full-swing, according to Ryan Klobas, CEO of the Napa County Farm Bureau.
The same is the case in the Central Valley, California’s largest agricultural region. The air quality in the valley is so poor from the Canyon Zone, SCU Lighting Fire and other wildfires, that it’s been deemed hazardous to go outside without wearing a face mask. Farmworkers are being advised to wear N95 face masks, which there is a shortage of due to the coronavirus, in the Central Valley, the Napa region and elsewhere in California farm country.
A few important points need to be made about California farmworkers in this time of raging wildfires, coronavirus and, in regions like the Central Valley, 100-plus degree heat for weeks on end.
First, our farmworkers are doing heroic work for not a whole lot of money. Many make minimum wage and work 10-plus hours a day, 7 days-a-week, in order to bring home a good paycheck. Their heroic work is what allows the variety and abundance of food available to us daily at the grocery store. Farm Workers don’t ask us to give them credit for this — they do it to support themselves and their families. We should, however, give them credit — and respect.
Imagine for a moment — perhaps while enjoying some California-grown produce — if farmworkers suddenly decided it was just too hot, and that the risk of contracting a respiratory illness from smoke inhalation or catching Covid-19 was just too risky for them, so they decided to walk off the job, perhaps returning to Mexico or finding work here that’s less of a health risk? The results would be catastrophic to our food supply. Not only are farmworkers essential, they’re the workforce that stands between our being able to easily fill our pantries and refrigerators with food and the opposite, food shortages. People were alarmed by the temporary shortages of a few food and grocery items during the March to June lockdown. Without farmworkers, those food shortages become the norm, rather than a rare exception.
Additionally, most farmworkers in California are immigrants from Mexico, and a good percentage of those are undocumented. Many people rage against the undocumented working in our fields — except when sitting down to eat the food these workers plant, pick, pack and get shipped to supermarkets.
Congress and President Trump have been playing politics long enough with immigration reform. It’s time they sit down and hammer out a deal, particularly as it pertains to undocumented farmworkers who should be treated — the president and congress has designated them as essential after all — as a special class when it comes to immigration reform because without them the nation’s food supply is in danger.
We’ve taken food and farming for granted for far too long. If the coronavirus pandemic has taught us anything in this regard it’s that we can’t take our nation’s food supply for granted any longer. It should be right at the top of the list of critical and essential.
Lastly, on a state level the governor and state legislature need to make agriculture in general a higher priority.
To start, It’s time to stop kicking the can down the road when it comes to making additional water for irrigation available to farmers. The governor and state legislators need to realize that you can’t say agriculture is an essential industry but not give farmers an adequate supply of one of their most-essential tools — irrigation water. It’s time for Sacramento to actually prioritize water for farmers as critical and essential, rather than just doing so in name.
State politicians also need to do more to protect prime agricultural land from residential and commercial building encroachment. While it’s true one of the hallmarks of California agriculture and our farmers is their ability to grow more (higher yield) on less acreage, the fact is there’s a set and finite amount of land available for farming in the state. When 100 acres (or 10,000 acres) of farmland is lost to a commercial or residential development, for example, it never comes back as farmland.
Farmworkers too need better treatment from our elected leaders in Sacramento. The state, like the federal government, calls them critical and essential but does very little for them.
This should start with California’s congressional delegation. Republican and Democratic members of Congress need to come together in a bipartisan way and form a strong delegation to push for immigration reform, putting farmworkers and those involved in other areas of agriculture first.
Additionally, the governor and state legislators need to immediately look for ways to help increase the health and safety of farmworkers in the state. At the very least they need to obtain an adequate supply of N95 face masks for them in order to add some protection from the smoke from the wildfires.
But it shouldn’t stop there. As part of prioritizing agriculture — it is one of California’s leading industries after all — as critical and essential, Sacramento needs to identify (and act on) additional ways it can help farm workers, because without them the state’s food and farming infrastructure isn’t sustainable,
California leads the nation in agriculture production and sales, with over 70,000 farms and sales north of $47 billion annually, according to USDA. This modern miracle of agriculture is dependent on the workers who plant, pick, pack and ship what has become known throughout the nation and the world as “California-Grown.” Without them we’re all in trouble.
MJDOA Magazine columnist and contributing editor Victor Martino is founder/CEO of Third Wave Strategies, a marketing, product development, sales and business development firm specializing in the food and agribusiness industries. You can contact him at victormartino415@gmail.com.
