We told you yesterday about the Unites States Department of Agriculture’s newly formed Emergency Response Framework for the citrus disease Huanglongbing – also called citrus greening. Now Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack gives us more about the framework.
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While Huanglongbing has only been found in one tree in California, we have had several findings of the psyllid that spreads the disease – the Asian citrus psyllid. And that’s how things started in Florida several years ago. Citrus there has now seen major damage from Huanglongbing. So much, that in fact it has changed the Florida citrus industry.
But Vilsack says programs like this all depend on the passage of the farm bill, because without the farm bill there’s no funding.