Greetings AHPA members and Bee Culture readers. I hope you had a great summer with a good honey crop and/or strong queen sales and that you managed to keep your mite counts low.
With my family at home in California while my brothers and I finished up work in North Dakota, I had a chance to read my family history in the evenings. My great-great grandfather was a coal miner in Scotland, who, with his bride of 3 months, came over to America and ended up working in a mine near Lexington, Missouri. When a civil war battle occurred near their house, his wife, Janet, fed union soldiers during the skirmish. They ended up moving west and, like most of my ancestors, struggled to farm and make a living (there are 10 consecutive generations of American farmers in the Hiatt line). Several lived in tents in the sagebrush or in dugouts in the ground until they had the means to build a cabin or house. One of my great grandfathers built his house out of rocks from a canyon. I would like to have seen it today but it’s under water at the Pineview Reservoir near Ogden, Utah, the state having built a dam years ago.
Reading the accounts of my hard-working, homesteading progenitors has reminded me how good we have it. We don’t have to live off flour, molasses and sego roots to make it through the winter. Heck, I don’t even have to cook for myself for the 2 months I’m away from my family because my wife leaves me with a freezer full of homemade dinners. My forefathers would have thought my reheated lasagna was a feast! I also think about access to information and the speed of communication back then and feel a little ashamed at how irritated I get when my internet is slow. It’s our job to help the rising generation to appreciate what they have by teaching them how to work hard and even pushing them so they know they can do hard things. Mental toughness and an appreciation for what they have will help them in life far more than having things handed to them.
Switching gears, we were pleased to see the preliminary duties on some of the Argentine Honey companies almost double. The white price went up 25 cents because of it. As an organization, we have paid for a little over a third of the cost of the dumping suit review. We still need to come up with over $200,000. I want to personally thank those who have sent in money. Generous donations from Mann Lake and Dadant are vital to the work and very appreciated. Last December in San Diego, I urged everyone to donate 2 cents a pound on your average crop to cover the remaining owed on the review. “Many hands make light work,” my dad used to repeat often. I hope everyone can give a little.
Another piece of good news is the recent ruling that Vietnam remain a non-market economy. If that status had changed, the calculation on their tariff would very likely have decreased because it would have been based on their market price vs. surrogate pricing from other countries.
Our final big announcement is that we are starting a political action committee, the “Honey PAC.” Over the years, AHPA leadership has personally donated to our champions on the Hill at breakfasts, dinners and events with them. Because, as we know, “money talks”. And because it speaks so loudly, in the future, when Eric Silva / Consultant or AHPA Leadership attend these events, donations known to come from the whole industry carries more weight. The PAC will be able to accept money from other auxiliaries, such as other national and state organizations, coop members etc. Our first PAC meeting will be held during the convention in San Antonio at a lunch on Wednesday, December 4 at noon.
One more thing. The Department of Labor has a new rule that could potentially delay applications in 33 states. Check with your broker if you are filing in exempt state. North Dakota, Montana and Idaho are among the 17 exempted. We all might want to file earlier for the visas this upcoming year.
Well, to steal a phrase from my buddy Scott McArt at Cornell, “until next time, bee well and do good work.”
Chris Hiatt , Pres. AHPA
