CA LGMA Completes First Round of New Water Metrics Workshops

Over the last two weeks, the CA LGMA has held a series of in-person workshops and a webinar sharing information about its new water Metrics. This first series of workshops came to Salinas, Santa Maria, and Oxnard; future workshops will take the same information to the Imperial and Central Valleys of California.

The Metrics themselves are available on our Food Safety Practices page. Please note that you may need to replace the version you have with this one. In the version originally posted, Table 2D called for 3 monthly tests for Type B water used prior to 21 days before scheduled harvest. This should have remained one monthly test and has been corrected in the version that is up now.

The revised Metrics are a new way of looking at agricultural water—particularly of surface water that will be used during the final 21 days before scheduled harvest, which must now be treated. Feel free to contact Greg Komar with any questions about the standards.

The audit checklist and appendices that go with these Metrics are under development. We will share them once they are completed. While we don’t expect to begin enforcing these standards until August 1, we encourage you to familiarize yourself with the new requirements and to begin integrating these standards and practices before this date.

The Arizona LGMA has not yet adopted these Metrics, but is considering them now. We expect that these standards will be in place in both states by the time Arizona resumes shipping this fall.