This two-session event will feature vegetables and flowers in Session 1, and soils, fertility, and manure management in Session 2.

NYS Department of Agriculture and Markets FSMA inspectors are expected to step up farm visits this season. Why are they showing up on the farm asking about FSMA? Aren't we exempt? This noontime hour we will discuss the purpose of the farm visits and what produce farmers need to know.

This year's program will feature speakers covering critically important topics like disease management, updates in storage techniques, new varieties, and other production management practices. New for this year will be the Processor Panel where guests will have the chance to interact with some of the major chip processors in the northeast. Your participation will also earn you DEC and CCA points.

Join Cornell Cooperative Extension of Orange and Oneida Counties, the Cornell Vegetable Program, Harvest NY, and the Eastern NY Horticulture Team on Feb. 12 for a remote Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs) training. Good Agricultural Practices is a voluntary food safety audit program requiring minimum standards for the production, handling, packing, and storing of fresh fruits and vegetables, and is required by some buyers. Trainers will cover food safety best management practices related to worker training, preharvest assessments and wildlife management, water testing, postharvest handling, hygienic equipment design and efficient wash-pack setups, how to write a farm food safety plan, and more. The training will follow the USDA GAPs audit checklist so that farms will be prepared for an audit. A NYSDAM GAPs auditor will join us to discuss audit logistics and answer questions from participants. Following the course, we will offer a series of virtual office hours to follow up with course participants to assist them with writing their farm food safety plan, which is mandatory for the GAPs audit. Participants will receive a certificate of course completion after the training.

In this session, we will discuss what counts as processing and what doesn't. Stories of inspectors coming to farmers markets and auctions telling some growers certain products can't be sold usually without much explanation. We will try to make some sense of things and clear up some misunderstandings so hopefully the upcoming season goes smoothly.

Can having a traceback process for your produce (and other farm products) make good business sense regardless of FSMA regulations? We will (try to) make the case for farms to have some sort of traceability mechanism in place.

Presented by Christy Hoepting (CCE Cornell Vegetable Program) and Ann Hazelrigg (Univ. of VT), this webinar will focus on organic management of pests and diseases of onions, garlic, leeks. The webinar is part of a series supported by the Transition to Organic Partnership Program. 

This two-day workshop will train fruit and vegetable growers and others interested in produce safety, the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), the Produce Safety Rule, Good Agricultural Practices (GAPSs), and co-management of natural resources and food safety. (A remote attendance option is available.)

This meeting will provide muck onion growers with a heads-up prior to the 2025 growing season: Stemphylium leaf blight in onion transplants and its effect on SLB epidemics and fungicide resistance, onion thrips topics, and information on potential use of a weekly scouting app to map onion thrips pressure in Elba. 2.0 DEC recertification credits will be offered in 1a, 10, and 23. CCA credits will be available too.

Processing vegetable industry members who grow, manage, or support crop production for Farm Fresh First/Nortera Foods, Seneca Foods and/or Love Beets, are encouraged to sign-up for the 2025 NYS Processing Vegetable Industry Meeting! You will:

• Network at this in-person meeting.
• Learn the results of industry-funded research.
• Have a voice in Cornell research and Extension.
• Earn 2.0 DEC pesticide applicator recertification credits
• Earn 2.0 Certified Crop Advisor Credits

Can we win the rot race? At this pre-season meeting, Oswego muck onion growers will hear the complexities of bacterial bulb rot of onion. An open discussion between growers and allied industry reps will be led by Christy Hoepting. 1.0 DEC recertification credits in categories 1a, 10 and 23 will be available.

The NYS Dry Bean Meeting will be paired with the annual Dry Bean Cutting Event again this year! The morning meeting will include presentations on the latest dry bean research in New York, with topics including market updates, dry bean variety breeding and trial updates, white mold control, Western bean cutworm management, and identifying management tactics for major pests in dry beans. DEC and CCA credits will be available.

The Dry Bean Cutting will follow the meeting and showcase the canned dry beans from the 2024 Dry Bean Variety Trial.