By COLIN M. STEWART
Tribune-Herald Staff Writer
More than $500,000 has been targeted for efforts to fight the coffee berry borer on the Big Island.
The pest, which was discovered on the island in 2010, is now responsible for the damage or destruction of up to 50 percent of some farmers’ coffee yields in the Kona and Ka‘u regions, according to experts.
Tom Greenwell, owner and operator of Greenwell Farms, a coffee farm and processing company that purchases coffee cherry from more than 300 small farmers in Kona, said Wednesday that more than 90 percent of the farms he deals with have been affected by the pest in some way.
“I’d say that … by the end of the year, what our mill saw was a 21 to 22 percent infestation (of coffee processes) by weighted average,” Greenwell said.
The money to fight the berry borer will come from two different sources.
A total of $200,000 will come from the state’s “barrel tax” funds, collected through taxes on petroleum products, Gov. Neil Abercrombie said in announcing his intent to veto House Bill 283, which sought funding of $196,000 for berry borer mitigation through the state’s agricultural loan fund.
“Rather than use funds meant to help farmers who have trouble obtaining financing, the Department of Agriculture plans to use $200,000 of barrel tax funds in its commitment to eradicate the coffee berry borer and in order to meet the intent of this bill,” said a release from the Governor’s Office.
Clift Tsuji, the sponsor of HB 283, said Wednesday he was all for finding money to fund the fight against invasive species, but he disagrees with the governor’s plan to fund the project through the barrel tax, rather than an agricultural loan.
“To tap the barrel tax is much less desirable,” Tsuji said. “To be blunt, I think sometimes there is an over-abusing of the fund because that money is readily accessible. It becomes too easy to dip into that. I hope the governor and his advisers, in their wisdom, do not take the veto route and tap the barrel tax fund.”
As for the berry borer and efforts to mitigate its effects, Tsuji said he’d like to see more money directed toward the coffee industry.
“(The appropriations are) not a substantial amount, considering what devastation is being done by the berry borer,” he explained.
In addition to the barrel tax funds, a relatively new nonprofit trade organization announced this month that it had been awarded a $330,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service to control and contain the berry borer.
The Synergistic Hawaii Agriculture Council (SHAC) is a consortium of three separate agricultural industry organizations, including the Hawaii Coffee Association, the Hawaii Papaya Industry Association, and the Hawaii Floriculture and Nursery Association. SHAC represents 543 businesses across the state, and industries that earned a total of $120 million in Hawaii in 2010.
Rod Yonemura, who wrote the grant proposal for SHAC, says the money will partly be used to treat farms with a fungus that has been shown to be effective in controlling the berry borers.
“The treatment might cost $200 a gallon. A lot of farmers might say, ‘The coffee berry borer’s already cost me a lot of money, why should I put more money into my coffee field?’ … We’re trying to give them an option,” Yonemura said.
First and foremost, however, will be an effort to prune wild and abandoned coffee trees in the affected areas of the island, which can serve as locations for the beetles to reproduce and re-infect nearby farms.
“It’s the most devastating pest of coffee in the world, and it’s fast spreading,” he said.
Yonemura’s proposal stated as its goal reducing the infestation on Hawaii Island farms to 2 to 5 percent within three years, he said.
“That’s been shown to be possible in other coffee growing countries around the world who have had to deal with the berry borer,” he said.
Email Colin M. Stewart at cstewart@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
