AGC Latest Happenings
Welcome AGC Growers and Partners!
Congratulations, you've successfully found the Blog page of the new AGC website!
Here you will be able to find the latest industry news and commentaries by industry leaders and growers like you.
We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family and friends. As we enter this holiday season and reflect on this year, we are thankful for your continued support and participation which helped get us this far and gave impetus to forming the Avocado Growers of California (AGC) advocacy group. We are now closing in on 200 members! Many of you have become paying members and we are looking forward to the rest of you contributing as well. For only $40 and a commitment of $140 per year you can become a full-fledged Incorporating Member. This is a non-profit organization lead by volunteers, so all funds go toward getting our message out and implementing changes that will help the California avocado industry thrive.
IT'S HERE! AGC'S WEBSITE!
AGC's Steering Committee is proud to announce AVOGC.COM is NOW LIVE.
THANK YOU to our media partners i9media for their generosity, believing in our cause, and for their outstanding work. We would also like to thank Kevin and Eddie Grangetto for their continued sponsorship and for introducing us to i9media. We encourage you to explore the website, share the link, and give us your feedback. This is a culmination of many thoughtful hours of work form the steering committee and i9 media. Avogc is just the beginning of AGC's public website, as we grow, so will our website. We think you will all agree this is a major milestone in that it provides a source for our members to get the latest news about AGC and the entire avocado industry. We also hope that it will serve as the go to platform for discourse and ideas and will recruit new members to keep our group growing.
SPEAKING OF GROWING UP. . .
Thanks to all of AGC's Incorporating Members for their contributions.
To date we have raised a total of $2,010 and counting. Your generosity will help fund our incorporation and cover our costs related to the administration of AGC and our website. Click Here if you would like to contribute. We are in the process of filing our articles of incorporation to become a non-profit 501(c)(5) membership benefits corporation. The IRS defines a 501(c)(5) as a corporation that promotes the interests of persons engaged in raising livestock, harvesting crops or aquatic resources, cultivating useful or ornamental plants or similar pursuits. Furthermore, Section 501(c) (5) provides for exemption from tax on earnings of labor, agricultural or horticultural organizations. Although the AGC’s earnings are tax exempt, contributions to it are not considered charitable deductions and therefore not tax deductible as such. However, they may be deductible as a business expense, such as a marketing expense. Please talk to your accountant. We will provide you with more incorporating details and we will also announce the board and corporate officers in December's meeting.
DECEMBER'S AGC MONTHLY MEETING
Our next Business meeting is December 14th
Please mark your calendars and join us for our next business meeting Thursday, December 14th, at Pala Casino. The meeting starts at 10:00 am and ends at noon. This date is different from the usual last Thursday of the month meetings due to the holidays.
Our next meeting will be more a mix of business and horticulture. We will discuss the new incorporation of AGC and our new website, and we will discuss strategies and priorities for 2024. We had a highly successful meeting last time with very positive feedback. We try to improve with every meeting, and we think this is evidenced by the increased attendance we have seen. Please spread the word about AGC to other growers in your area. Our October meeting was horticulturally oriented. Jim Davis, PCA, Owner of Better Bugs IPM gave a fascinating presentation on pest management for both conventional and organic avocado groves. We are sure that every attendee walked out with some new idea that they could implement. Maybe even the presenter Jim!