Chatting With Co-Founder & Director President At Farmroot, Owner At Pawelski Farms- Chris Pawelski From Orange County, New York, United States- Smart Cherrys Thoughts- Sai Charan Paloju

Chatting With Co-Founder & Director President At Farmroot, Owner At Pawelski Farms – Chris Pawelski From Orange County, New York, United States- Christopher Pawelski- M.A. University of Iowa, Major: Communication Studies, Minor: Film Studies (1990) B.A. SUNY Cortland, Communication Studies—Radio/Television
Summa Cum Laude, Phi Kappa Phi (1988).Chris has been farming since he was old enough to run behind a harvester picking up stray onions. For nearly 25 years he’s been a staunch advocate for farmers in the Hudson Valley
helping to shape and direct agricultural policy and legislation in the areas of trade, labor, food
waste/recovery, conservation programs, flood control, pesticide usage & application, crop
insurance and disaster aid.

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Chris’s advocacy efforts on the federal level have benefited numerous farmers. He successfully lobbied for a $10 million earmark to aid Orange County onion farmers that was part of the 2002 Farm Bill. He worked with legislators and the USDA to develop a crop insurance pilot program that was implemented within one year of its approval (almost unheard of in the industry). He has
presented testimony on Capitol Hill before the United States Senate Agriculture Committee. He was interviewed by the Senate Democrat Policy Committee concerning the potential affects of the 2002 Farm Bill. Working with then Rep. John Hall, Chris developed legislation for a new soil conservation program for muck farms called the Conservation on Muck Soils (COMS)
program. It was a $50 million dollars a year or $250 million dollars over 5 years program that passed in the House version of the 2008 Farm Bill. Though it did not survive the final conference committee negotiations it continues to be considered for subsequent Farm Bills. Most recently Chris was interviewed by the United States Department of Justice on the recent Bayer-Monsanto merger. At the New York State level he has assisted in securing funding for the benefit of farmers and
farm workers. He successfully lobbied for the return of $50,000 in onion research funding in the
New York State FY19 budget, increased to $70,000 in the FY20 budget and successfully lobbied
for a FY19 grant to help fund the Warwick Area Migrant Committee summer program for
migrant farmworker children.

Chris regularly appears in and/or serves as a background source on agricultural policy and legislation in numerous media outlets.
National: Associate Press, UPI, CNN, CBS Evening News, WABC Eyewitness News, Fox News Latino, Successful Farming’s syndicated radio program, The New York Times. International: BBC radio, BBC TV, Univision, The Hindu Trade Publications: American Agriculturalist, American Vegetable Grower, Farm Journal, Focus on Farming, National Onion Association Newsletter, NY Farm Bureau’s The Voice of New York Agriculture, Onion World, Successful Farming. Regional: Albany Times Union, Cable 6 News, The Citizen, The Cornell Daily Sun, The Cornell Review, Democrat and Chronicle, Hudson Valley Magazine, Mid Hudson News, Poughkeepsie Journal, Regional Network News (RNN), WAMC (Northeast Public Radio) “Vox Pop”.

Check out the documentary short “Muckville,” which deals with farmer mental health and suicde and can be found at https://watchlocal.hudsy.tv/programs/muckville

Also be sure to check out The Ornery Onion Company: https://orneryonion.com

And Ornery Onion merch: https://ornery-onion-company.creator-spring.com

Christopher Pawelski (@ChrisPawelski) on X

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