NEW HAMPSHIRE NEWS 



NEW COORDINATOR 



Laurie Bryant of Hancock has been 

 hired as New Hampshire "Agricul- 

 ture in the Classroom" Educational 

 Coordinator for the 1990-91 school 

 year. 



"Agriculture in the Classroom" is 

 a national effort to provide support 

 and reinforcement for teachers in 

 the job of helping people develop 

 an awareness of agriculture. In 

 New Hampshire, it wants "to pro- 

 mote an awareness of the diversity 

 of New Hampshire Agriculture and 

 its contribution to the state's econ- 

 omy." It does this by sponsoring 

 teachers' workshops, organizing stu- 

 dent trips to working farms, selling 

 educational resources (booklets, 

 video cassettes, posters), etc. 



This program depends on private 

 funds and volunteers, but there 



doesn't seem to be much input 

 from the greenhouse/nursery indus- 

 try. For more information and a 

 chance to help out, the address is: 

 Agriculture in the Classroom, 295 

 Sheep Davis Road, Concord, NH 

 03301; the phone number is (603) 

 224-1934. 



FARM DAYS REVISITED 



Six hundred people attended New 

 Hampshire Farm Days (July 27) at 

 Knoxland Farm In Weare, accord- 

 ing to Lynne Blye, organizer. "It 

 rained in the morning," Lynne said, 

 "and people couldn't be haying, so 

 that was good for us." 



Three hundred people came to 

 breakfast. Ten gallons of syrup 

 had been donated by New Hamp- 

 shire producers and the eight that 

 weren't used on pancakes were auc- 



A NEW HOTLINE 



The USDA Pesticide Impact Program has set up a hotline (1-800- 

 262-0216 — between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. EST, Monday through Friday) 

 to give out information on re-registration of minor-use chemicals. 

 Almost all chemicals used by the nursery and greenhouse industry 

 are considered minor-use. Minor-use pesDcides tend not to be re-reg- 

 istered because the cost of developing data (environmental impact, 

 etc.) necessary for re-registration offsets any profit for the 

 manufacturer . 



The service given by the hotline is to let you know what pesticides 

 will be or not be re-registered before this information becomes public. 

 "This IS to alert users and give them time to find an alternative," ac- 

 cording to Rick Gomez, the program's director. 



However, Gomez says that if a pesticide is not to be re-registered and 

 a grower feels it is important to his operation, this early information 

 can be used to try to convince the manufacturer to change its mind. 



Or, if that doesn't work, the grower can request re-registration 

 through the Minor-Use Pesticide Regulation Program's "Inter-region- 

 al Research Project ■*4" (IR *4). Administered by Rutgers and funded 

 by the USDA, this very successful program has been around awhile 

 and has done the research necessary to re-reregister "thousands of 

 pesticides still on the shelves." (Doing this expensive work for the 

 company allows the company to continue to manufacture the product 

 without losing money.) 



The liaison person for IR *4 in New Hampshire is Jim Bowman at 

 the Department of Entomology, UNH, Durham. (Each New England 

 state seems to have its own contact person.) Anyone interested in 

 having an endangered minor-use pesticide reregistered can call Jim at 

 603-862-1159. He can give you request forms to fill out and will see 

 that they go to the right place. The pesticides are listed according to 

 priority; the most-requested are at the top — so perhaps your voice can 

 make a difference. 



tioned off to cover costs. Weeks 

 Dairy (Concord) and Stonyfield 

 Yogurt (Londonderry) contributed 

 dairy products and yogurt to the 

 meal. 



There were twenty product ex- 

 hibitors and two panel discussions 

 were held during the day. Panelists 

 on "Marketing" (40 attendees) in- 

 cluded Bill Stockman (Spiderweb 

 Gardens, Tuftonboro), Rick Hardy 

 (Brookdale Fruit Farms, HoUis), 

 and Sahrina Mattison (New Eng- 

 land Anenomes, Epsom). Panelists 

 on "Innovative Opportunities in 

 Agriculture" (25 attendees) were 

 Gil Sanboume (who raises llamas 

 at Llama-dama Farm in Lee), Les 

 Barden (who gives horse-drawn 

 hayrides at Barden Tree Farm in 

 Rochester), and Laura Gund (who 

 raises donkeys at Walnut Grove 

 Farm in Lee). These activities are 

 seen as sidelines; twenty-five at- 

 tendees picked up ideas with which 

 to begin profitable sidelines of their 

 own. 



Lynne would like to give "a spe- 

 cial thanks to Knoxland Equip- 

 ment, who were the hosts." 



THE DOPE ON 'NATIVE' 



(Weekly Market Bulktm, July 24, 

 1991) ' 



Every summer, inspectors ffom the 

 NHDA Bureau of Markets encoun- 

 ter instances in which the word 

 'native' 



IS misused in the selling of farm 

 products. 



The law reads as follows: "No 

 farm products sold, offered or ex- 

 posed for sale or distribution in the 

 state shall he labeled or described 

 as ^native' unless the name of the 

 state m which they were grown or 

 produced appears immediately after 

 the word "native'." (This does not 

 apply to eggs.) 



It is acceptable to abbreviate the 

 name of the state: 'Native NH' is 

 okay. The law's intent is to allow 

 consumers to distinguish products 

 which are produced locally and 

 thereby benefit the producers them- 

 selves. 



October/November 1991 7 



