News

Martz tours grain lab, stresses need for funding

Drought causes facility to lose valuable
money

Gov. Judy Martz said her first tour of the financially strapped
Montana State Grain Lab on Tuesday emphasized the urgency of
finding means to keep the facility open.

By JO DEE BLACK
Tribune Staff Writer

The Great Falls lab, a division of the state Department of
Agriculture, is self-funded, operating on fees collected to test
grain for qualities including protein content and weight.

Drought has caused the number of samples submitted to dwindle,
drying up the lab’s revenue.

Ag organizations and state ag officials have worked together to
come up with a funding source to keep the lab open during lean
years.

"We met with Montana ag groups in January, and the consensus
was that we need to keep the lab open," said Ag Department
Director Ralph Peck, who accompanied Martz on the tour.

When farmers sell their grain at an elevator, they can request to
have a sample sent to the State Grain Lab instead of to a lab run
by a private company. Farm organizations are encouraging their
members to make such requests to boost sagging revenues.

In July, the Montana Wheat and Barley Committee and the state
Growth Through Agriculture program each provided $50,000 in
grants to help the lab cope with revenue shortfalls for this fiscal
year and to replenish the facility’s reserve fund.

Legislation is being drafted that would allow grain check-off
dollars to be used to supplement the lab’s operating budget
during future shortfalls.

Farmers pay $1 per 100 bushels of wheat sold and 72 cents per
100 bushels of barley sold in check-off dollars. Those dollars
fund the Montana Wheat and Barley Committee, which conducts
grain-marketing activities.

The proposed legislation will be introduced during the 2003
Legislature. Martz said her administration will support it if farmers
are in favor of it.

"We want to support producers as much as possible," she said.
"Agriculture is Montana’s number one industry."

Martz also noted that although Tuesday’s tour was her first
on-site visit, she’s been involved in discussions to keep the facility
afloat.

With this year’s harvest well under way, State Grain Lab
Manager Sharon Campbell said each of her eight staff members
started working 40-hour weeks as of Monday.

Budget constraints forced hour cutbacks at various times over
the past year.

Campbell said the $100,000 in grants was tapped during July,
typically one of the lab’s slowest months, but she hopes the
facility now will be able to operate on fees collected for samples.

In a good year, grain sample testing generates $350,000 to
$400,000, she said.

Some farmers are requesting their samples be sent to the state
lab, and there has been new business from farmers with
crop-insurance claims who must have testing done at a federally
licensed lab, Campbell said.

"The lab’s difficult financial times go in cycles," Peck said. "About
two out of every 10 years it needs help to make it."

The cycles are tied to two types of harvests, he said.

In drought years, when production is down, fewer samples are
sent to the state lab. The lab also typically gets fewer samples
during harvests with good yields, Peck said.

"There’s a greater demand for testing during years when we have
frost damage or sprouting," he said.

http://www.greatfallstribune.com/news/stories/20020828/localnews/517866.html

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