Europe bans US poultry

Despite the fact that a disease outbreak is limited to noncommercial birds in Southern California, the European Union has banned all imports of poultry meat from any location in the United States. Nearly 54-hundred backyard chickens and other birds have been infected with exotic Newcastle disease, in Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Europe then banned American poultry products, even though no commercial flocks have been affected.

Almond shipments remain backed up

They're facing severe delays at their key season, and almond marketers say they can't predict when normal export shipping will resume. Customers in Europe and Asia want to buy almonds now, before the holidays. But the West Coast port shutdown cut off most shipments, and recovery has been slow. The Blue Diamond almond cooperative says it would normally export a million-and-a-half pounds of nuts through West Coast ports each day.

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Raisin growers look for solutions

The California raisin industry will consider more proposals to reduce production. Farmers and packers have been suffering from low prices, and want to bring supplies more in line with demand. The Raisin Administrative Committee will discuss tomorrow (Tuesday) a program to encourage all growers to reduce production 25 percent. The plan would also encourage more farmers to remove grapevines, and would seek to sell more raisins to the federal school lunch program.

Farm milk price to increase

Higher cheese prices will result in a 10-percent raise for California dairy farmers. The state Department of Food and Agriculture says dairy farmers will earn an average price of $1 dollar, 15 cents a gallon for milk, beginning next month. The increase comes after farm milk prices have dropped for most of the past year. The state sets the farm price of milk each month using a complex formula.

On the calendar: :
It's a big day in Half Moon Bay, where the World-Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off takes place today (Monday).

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