Word: grapes
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CESAR CHAVEZ, the head of the United Farm Workers (UFW), was in town this week to drum up support for a new grape boycott. It seems the governor of California, George Deukmejian, has turned a deaf ear to the plight of the impoverished--in some cases, starving--laborers, in sharp contrast to the open-arms policies of Chavez old friend, former governer Jerry Brown. Chavez objects specifically to Deukmejian's recent line-veto of an appropriation by the state congress which was to speed up the collection of millions of dollars in back pay owed the workers. But that issue...
...things change, the uncertainty of their futures concerns many California farmers. "This is the worst it's ever been," complained Irwin Effird, 64, who raises mostly grapes on his 2,000-acre spread near Clovis. "I came through the '30s and can remember the problems. But back then the whole country was in the same position, not just farmers." Now there is a glut of domestic raisins and Effird's farm is worth half what it was just three years ago. Pat Ricchioti, 65, a grape and fruit farmer with 3,000 acres near Madera, was also gloomy. "I never...
...hangar Ray was loading the plane. Four dozen eggs. A case of Old Milwaukee. A case of Budweiser. A roll of roofing tar paper. Cat Chow. Meow Mix. Grape-Nuts flakes. Bread. A broom. "Some of them out there are brand conscious," Carol said. "Some are quality conscious. Some you just know what to get. One cat at the Allison ranch, for instance, won't eat anything but Purina...
This fall's California grape harvest was a race against the sun. Unseasonable heat of up to 105° threatened to ripen the fruit too quickly and spoil it for winemaking. But as the last bunches of plump red and golden grapes were dumped safely into crushers last week, growers and vintners were in no mood to raise their goblets to Bacchus. Because of a worldwide glut of wine, this year's harvest of nearly 2 million tons of grapes will be far more than needed. "We are in a hell of a bind here," says Earl Rocca...
During the 1970s, the California wine boom seemed like a party that would never end. In the past ten years, growers boosted wine-grape acreage by 26%, to 363,000. Nearly 100 new wineries took root between 1978 and 1982 in the Napa Valley and adjoining Sonoma County. But sales, which had grown by an average 6% annually during the 1970s, suddenly flattened in 1982 at about 360 million gal., and have grown only marginally since then. Growers who planted their vines in anticipation of blossoming demand are finding a market that has shriveled like a raisin. Thompson seedless grapes...