Countywide : Forum Planned on Organic Crops

A Ventura-based nonprofit organization called Mothers & Others for Safe Foods, which opposes the use of pesticides on food crops, will sponsor a community forum in Ventura Wednesday.

The forum, which will include representatives from two consumers groups, a produce buyer, a large-scale organic grower, a pediatrician and a farm adviser for the University of California, will cover topics ranging from the health effects of pesticides to organic farming techniques.

Stephen Pavich, who has a 2,000-acre table-grape farm in Delano, Calif., is scheduled to speak at the forum. He said Monday that Ventura County citrus and row-crop growers could reduce or eliminate pesticides with techniques similar to those he has used for 20 years.

Pavich uses 50 or 60 techniques, including beneficial insects that prey on pests and mixing crops.

“The proof is in the pudding, and I can tell them it works,” Pavich said.

Donald Reeder, a Fillmore citrus grower who is president of the Ventura County Farm Bureau, said the weather, soil and crops vary drastically between the San Joaquin Valley, where Delano is located, and the south coast.

“The beneficial bugs that work in Delano might not work in Ventura,” Reeder said. Nevertheless, he said, Ventura County growers are working to reduce pesticide use.

“We’re just as conscious about pesticides as the organic grower or the environmentalists,” he said. “And dollars are a factor too. It costs us $150 every time we run a spray rig through the orchard.”

Reeder said he and several other farmers plan to attend the forum Wednesday to learn more about organic farming and about consumer concerns.

Mothers & Others for Safe Foods was founded by Ventura resident Frances Scharli in 1989. Scharli formed the group in reaction to the Environmental Protection Agency announcement declaring Alar a suspected carcinogen.

The 7 p.m. forum at the Poinsettia Pavilion, 3451 Foothill Road in Ventura, is the second annual session for the Mothers & Others group.