Agricultural infrastructure

The AP regularly moves editorials appearing in newspapers throughout the United States and some from foreign nations. Here is one that moved on the AP wire this week, and it touches a local matter that comes in and out of my mind every now and then:

Federal legislation prompted by a spate of food safety scares, some of them deadly, took effect recently. ... It will require labels identifying the country of origin of fresh fruit, vegetables, nuts, meats and frozen produce. Seafood origin has been labeled since 2005. ...

While this law is a good beginning, more can be done.Food and other goods from some countries have been the source of so many incidents that the mere mention of the country's name can cause alarm, as in the case of China.

While the country-of-origin label might unfairly taint some harmless goods, consumers have a right to know where food was produced and then decide for themselves. ...

Given a choice between apples grown in China, which produces 35 percent of the world's supply, and those grown in upstate New York, many consumers might prefer the latter, even if they have to pay more for them.

The labeling law is not perfect, and it doesn't cover everything. ...

Ultimately, the goal must be to improve food safety worldwide. Education, tighter food handling rules and other precautions are needed to prevent food-borne illnesses. ... To do so would require expanding the role of the Food and Drug Administration, which often finds itself reacting to deadly outbreaks instead of having the tools to prevent them. ...

— The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J.

Years ago, we had a lot more full-time and part-time farmers in this area. Their numbers dwindled, and the business infrastructure that supported them disappeared.

The number of slaughterhouses has gone down, I'm sure. The Huntington Pride in Tobacco market left town about a decade ago.

If I wanted to start a commercial apple orchard in this area, or if I had a couple thousand acres of bottomland along the Ohio River and I wanted to grow tomatoes to sell to big-time wholesalers, could I?

I see fewer dairy farms in operation, so I can't tell you if there are enough buyers of raw milk to make that business viable locally.

I don't know. I don't have the land or the equipment for either, so I'm not about to make inquiries. But it would seem to make sense that if we want to encourage people to go into small business, agriculture would be a good place to start if we have access to the economic infrastructure small farmers would need.