Peanuts - does anyone grow them and sell them? What's the legality?

[oosik]

It might be a workable idea IT but it could upset the corn farmers and their strangle hold on the gasoline industry. Talk about an ongoing CRP - the corn farmers continue on their march down fat street. I really don't understand why we don't just call it what it is - a massive subsidy for the corn farmers.

 

[Rock knocker]

I like peanuts and peanut butter. But the darn stuff has gotten to be $3 a pound!!

I've grown them before also. REAL easy in the right soil/climate. Great for the soil. Easy to process. Good yields, over 3,000 lbs/ acre.

But when BRIEFLY looking into it I ran across few articles on doing it commercially.

In the Good Morning thread:


Apparently it's heavily regulated.

So does anyone here grow them and sell them?

If I plant a half acre and want to sell 1,000 lbs locally am I liable to be busted?

/edit - at 3,000 lbs/acre and $0.228/lb that's almost $700/acre.

I don't think it is quite as you claim. It seems as though if a farm is participating in the government allotment and subsidy program for any crop, then other crops can also be regulated. So this is what is likely occuring in the farms that you speak of. If a farmer has weaned himself entirely from the government teat, then they can grow what they want, where they want, when they want. So those only people being stopped from growing peanuts are those rugged individual farmers who get rural welfare. So they have the power them selves to rectify this wrong doing that is being done to them, all they have to do is say no when the USG comes with money.

Pretty simple.

Peanut Profile | Agricultural Marketing Resource Center

 

[smstonypoint]

From memory, there was a government buyout of peanut quotas in the early 2000s. Now, anyone can produce and sell peanuts. However, I believe you need a production history in order to qualify for government income support programs.

Steve

 

[mobilus]

I'd think that an endeavor that produced only half a ton per year would be considered gardening. Can't believe any government agency outside of the western seaboard states would care in the least. Good luck!

 

[newbury]

Pretty sure the allotment gives you as the farmer a garranteed bottom price, or something, but large growers have buyers before the even think about planting. If you don't already have a contract, it's pure gamble,

My viewpoint was that before I read txdon's writing

The government issued allotments but then the government bought back the allotments that allowed peanut selling/planting. Without the allotments you cannot sell the peanuts.

I don't think it is quite as you claim.

I'm not claiming any thing other than it seems to be heavily regulated. In my surfing I ran across things like

Peanut growers told of legal implications of saving seed

Varieties protected under the USDA-administrated PVPA may not be sold, marketed, offered for sale, delivered, consigned or exchanged without the explicit consent of the owner of the variety.

source http://www.southeastfarmpress.com
So what bothered me was

Without the allotments you cannot sell the peanuts

From memory, there was a government buyout of peanut quotas in the early 2000s. Now, anyone can produce and sell peanuts. However, I believe you need a production history in order to qualify for government income support programs.

Steve

Hopefully that's the case.
I wasn't about to clearcut another 400 acres and become a major peanut farmer but just my relatives and I could easily go through 100 pounds a year. But if I grew 200 pounds I'd like to be able to sell any surplus.

 

[turnkey4099]

AH - much like the CRP(Conservation Reserve Program) programs we have out in this neck of the woods.

Simlar to the wheat allotments back in the 50s/50s. That was basically paying farmers not to grow stuff due to glutting the market.

 

[smstonypoint]

/edit - at 3,000 lbs/acre and $0.228/lb that's almost $700/acre.

Per the USDA, the total cost of producing peanuts averaged $875.38/acre across farms in 2016: USDA ERS - Commodity Costs and Returns

Steve

 

[paulsharvey]

My viewpoint was that before I read txdon's writing


I'm not claiming any thing other than it seems to be heavily regulated. In my surfing I ran across things like source http://www.southeastfarmpress.com
So what bothered me was


Hopefully that's the case.
I wasn't about to clearcut another 400 acres and become a major peanut farmer but just my relatives and I could easily go through 100 pounds a year. But if I grew 200 pounds I'd like to be able to sell any surplus.

Couple of hundred pounds is not much. I would expect that to be way less than 1/4 acre, and you could easily do the peanuts up as boiled. Ocala (Citra) and Williston are major peanut growing areas in north central Florida, and I know that some guys selling boiled peanuts grow them, but most get a few bushels from bigger farms.

 

[wngsprd]

From memory, there was a government buyout of peanut quotas in the early 2000s. Now, anyone can produce and sell peanuts. Steve

The allotment program was ended, as Steve says. The price fell, so the number of acres planted in Virginia fell as well. Southeastern Virginia farmers still grow peanuts, but switched many acres over to cotton, soybeans and corn.

newbury, check with your local ag office on any limits or programs.

 

[aczlan]

Peanut growers told of legal implications of saving seed

Varieties protected under the USDA-administrated PVPA may not be sold, marketed, offered for sale, delivered, consigned or exchanged without the explicit consent of the owner of the variety.

source http://www.southeastfarmpress.com
So what bothered me was

Without the allotments you cannot sell the peanuts

My guess, is that it is something sort of like the "Club Varieties" of apples.
With those, you buy the trees from the club (whoever bankrolled the development for that variety/subvariety) and you are licensed for X number of trees.
If you are found have more trees than you are licensed for then you can be fined according to the contract you signed when you bought the trees.
In some cases you also commit to sell the apples from those trees back to the club.

Aaron Z