Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/54939
Access to China is near China and the United States are working towards a reciprocal agreement for pears. by Geraldine Warner he said. Whereas the U.S. regulatory process is fairly rigid in terms of how it moves forward, the Chinese approval process is more flexible. Orchard-Rite® "We're hoping that the process will allow for pears from the United States from the 2012 crop to be exported to China," he said. There are a number of steps that have to occur, he added, but the two govern- ments appear to be working towards the goal of reciprocal access by the fall. • Wind Machines • www.orchard-rite.com "Orchard Rite Service is second to none." I t's been almost two decades since the U.S. pear industry began push- ing for access to China, but it finally appears that the market might open during the 2012-2013 season. "This has been a long-term effort to gain access for pears," noted Mark Pow- ers, vice president at the Northwest Horti- cultural Council. "It's taken many years to get to the state where we're at, and part of that whole process was getting pears prioritized by our own government and getting them to move forward." Access for U.S. pears into China will be tied to access for Chinese sand pears into the United States. China is already allowed to export Ya and Fragrant pears to this country. Sand pears are Asian-style pears and are crisp, unlike the European pears produced in the United States. U.S. access to China should be for all Euro- pean pear varieties. TreeTAC, the tree fruit industry's Tech- nical Advisory Council, is evaluating the plant health risks associated with the potential importation of sand pears. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has pub- lished a notice in the Federal Register on the proposal to allow imports of sand pears. The comment period ended February 14. Meanwhile, the industry is also evalu- ating the feasibility of mitigation meas- ures that China has proposed for U.S. pears. China's concerns are the risks of fireblight and codling moth, which it claims it does not have. Powers said the industry is working with the U.S. govern- ment to propose alternative measures that will protect China against pests and diseases but at the same time allow com- mercial trade to occur. Negotiators at a bilateral meeting last November intended to have an agree- ment in place by March or April this year, www.goodfruit.com "We're real believers in the Auto Start option." acreage in apples and pears. From November to February, we can deal with arctic events that will take our temperature into the single digits—and even subzero. A I really don't think it's possible to grow stone fruit economically in the Yakima Valley without wind machines. This last year, we would not have even had an apricot crop without them. All of our wind machine purchases since 1982 have been Orchard-Rite. In the wintertime, when we're starting these machines, the temperatures are usually single digits to subzero. We depend on—and have complete confidence in—our Orchard-Rite® Wind Machines and the service we receive. We still have the first Orchard-Rite® Wind Machine we ever bought! We're real believers in the Auto Start option. We order Auto Start on all our new machines. To date, we've retrofitted about 50% of our old machines, and plan to put the Auto Start on the remaining machines. Steve Nunley, Farming Operations Manager Pride Packing, Wapato, Washington Get the Orchard-Rite® story from your nearest representative: Steve Nunley s the operations manager for Pride Packing, I am responsible for managing 2,800 acres of orchard under 260 wind machines. Of that, approximately 1,000 acres are in stone fruit with the remaining 1615 W. Ahtanum • Yakima, WA 98903 • 509-248-8785, ext. 612 For the representative nearest you, visit our Web site: www.orchard-rite.com GOOD FRUIT GROWER FEBRUARY 15, 2012 11