Several California Republican congressional members, including U.S. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), have successfully garnered federal support for California pistachio growers fighting a tree disease.
Pistachio Bushy Top Syndrome (PBTS), a bacterial infection, is now part of the federal Tree Assistance Program (TAP) authorized under the 2014 Farm Bill to provide financial assistance to qualifying orchardists and nursery tree growers to replant or rehabilitate eligible trees, bushes and vines damaged by natural disasters, which includes plant diseases, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA).
The expanded TAP program comes six months after several California members of Congress questioned USDA in a bipartisan letter about why PBTS wasn’t TAP-eligible.
“We commend FSA California State Committee Chairman Greg Wegis and his fellow committee members for taking decisive action to help Central Valley and California pistachio growers who suffered losses over the past several years” from PBTS,” said Rep. McCarthy and U.S. Reps. Jeff Denham (R-CA), David Valadao (R-CA), Doug LaMalfa (R-CA), and Paul Cook (R-CA) in a joint statement.
“Making this disease eligible under the Tree Assistance Program will mitigate some of the losses our pistachio growers incurred and help ensure that California remains the leading pistachio producing state in the Union,” the lawmakers said.
First observed in 2011, PBTS inhibits tree growth and reduces or eliminates a tree’s pistachio production, according to the California Pistachio Research Board.
Pistachio production in California was the seventh top commodity valued at over $1.5 billion and the fifth most valuable export crop, according to 2016-2017 data from the state’s Department of Food and Agriculture.
“The pistachio industry was able to achieve this critically needed assistance program through the diligent work of American Pistachio Growers and our California Congressional officials,” said Richard Matoian, executive director of the American Pistachio Growers.
Matoian said the California delegation “understood the devastating impacts Pistachio Bushy Top Syndrome had and is continuing to have on California’s pistachio growers.” He added that the action will guarantee assistance to “those growers who were hurt, through no fault of their own, by this devastating disease.”
Pistachio tree producers who incurred pistachio tree losses due to PBTS will be able to sign up starting on Oct. 15 under TAP. If the TAP application is approved, the eligible trees must be replaced within 12 months from the date the application is approved.