USDA Rejects Restrictions on California’s Produce

Florida’s petition to restrict California produce was shot down Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which said that California’s efforts to contain the Medfly are ensuring the purity of state-grown fruits and vegetables.

Florida’s petition could be reconsidered within 30 days. But barring a major new outbreak of the Mediterranean fruit fly in California, the federal government will “leave things the way they are now, because California is beating the Medfly,” a spokesman for the department’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service said.

In rejecting Florida’s petition to have all California produce inspected and certified free of Medfly larvae, the Department of Agriculture noted that no Medfly has been caught since May 1 in any of California’s more than 35,000 traps deployed in Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

The policies outlined in Florida’s petition, if ordered by the Department of Agriculture, would have profoundly wounded California’s multibillion-dollar farm economy, much of which lies outside the areas where Medflies have been caught. In addition to requesting special inspection and certification, Florida agriculture officials had asked the federal government to make California enact tougher and broader Medfly eradication efforts--to deploy more traps statewide and spray malathion more often and over a wider area.

“Florida was the only state within the panel making a strong pitch for the petition,” said Isi Siddiqui, assistant director of the California Department of Food and Agriculture and the state’s representative to the advisory council.

Siddiqui said Florida’s proposal would have cost California taxpayers “hundreds of thousands of dollars in unnecessary measures to regulate millions of tons of fruit.”

Florida agriculture officials vowed to push again for the measure, particularly if more Medflies turn up next month in California traps.

“We’re reasonable in Florida,” said Richard Gaskalla, director of the Florida Department of Agriculture’s division of plant industry. “We want additional assurances, but we’re willing to compromise and wait another 30 days.”

Word of the Department of Agriculture’s decision came as helicopter crews were preparing to spray malathion over the city of Garden Grove in Orange County for the last time Wednesday night.

No other areas are scheduled to be sprayed in either Los Angeles or Orange counties, but eradication officials say the true test of the program’s success will come in June, when the warm temperatures and abundant food supply create ideal conditions for the Medfly.

Anticipating the possibility of renewed spraying, the Los Angeles City Council gave preliminary approval Wednesday to a measure that would bar malathion-spraying helicopters from using airports within the city.

In a 12-0 vote, the council ordered the city attorney’s office to draw up an ordinance barring the helicopters from Los Angeles International Airport, Van Nuys Airport and all private airports within city limits.

Councilman Joel Wachs said the measure was primarily aimed at possible use of Van Nuys Airport, a “neighborhood airport with a sensitive problem of noise pollution.”

Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Walston said the measure will have no effect on the eradication campaign because the state has wide-ranging powers during such an emergency and can overrule any local ordinances.

The helicopters used through most of the infestation took off from El Monte Airport, but their base was moved this month to Riverside Municipal Airport.

Pogatchnik reported from Washington and Dunn from Los Angeles.