Governor Corzine wants to delete the state’s Department of Agriculture. The role of the Department of Environmental Protection – which would be the new liaison for farmers under Corzine’s plan – doesn’t include caring for the needs of farms and farmers. But NJ is The Garden State! We need our farms, and what’s more, without them NJ will quickly turn into a cultural desert of mini-McMansions and strip malls. What a waste!
Robert Von Thun Jr., who grows vegetables, fruit and flowers on his South Brunswick farm, said farmers understand the need to streamline state government, but contends the Agriculture Department already runs efficiently.
The Agriculture Department oversees soil and water conservation, storm water and erosion, school nutrition programs, animal health, food safety, export markets, farmland preservation and commodity promotion.
New Jersey farms generate about $924 million per year and employ about 562,000 people, or nearly 12 percent of the state’s jobs.
. . . Mary Jo Herbert, of the Hopewell Heritage Farm, said the cut would make only a small dent in the state’s $33 billion budget but “would send the worst kind of signal.”
“I am a third-generation farmer and I, perhaps naively, believed that our state government was committed to preserving our farming heritage,” Herbert said.
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