Two hundred thirty miles away from the bucolic countryside of Schoharie County, Long Island farmers are laying claim to the podium in their arena of public opinion.

“It is time to be pro-active as the entire industry is under siege in so many ways,” says a new position paper issued by Long Island Farm Bureau. “We have all been effective in defending the industry as issues arise, but we have been negligent in telling our stories to the public, why the agricultural industry is so important from an economic, social, cultural, environmental, and historical viewpoint as to their quality of life on Long Island. We believe it is time to come together to develop a public relations campaign that will reinforce public support of our important industry.”

The fact that LIFB devotes about $100,000 of budget money a year says a lot about its priorities. The fact that it has a promotions coordinator on its staff says at least as much. These people are serious about promoting agriculture.

“I think this kind of pro-active promotion is essential for agriculture, as suburbia grows into farm country,” says Joseph Gergela III, executive director of LIFB. “They bring a suburban value system with them. They don’t realize what agriculture really is.”

He’s a realist, though. It’s not all about getting suburbia to accommodate agriculture.

“Agriculture has got to co-exist with its suburban neighbors,” says Joe.

Natasha Beccaria, LIFB’s part-time promotions coordinator, says their newest venture is a series of television advertisements. Local farm-related organizations have joined together to finance a series of advertisements that promote Long Island agriculture throughout the summer. Farm Bureau, Farm Family Insurance, Peconic Land Trust, Suffolk County Conservation District, and Cornell Cooperative Extension began a large scale campaign promoting Long Island agriculture in mid July. Commercials will run on the News 12 Metro Traffic and Weather, Food Network, Discovery Home, Speed Network, and the Travel Channel.

More than $35,000 have already been raised, and then matched by LIFB, to produce and air the advertisements, with a target of $100,000 in sight.

Television isn’t the whole story, though, when it comes to LIFB’s promotion of agriculture on Long Island. “We recently ran a Grown on Long Island Night at the Long Island Ducks minor league baseball game,” says Beccaria. “More than 60 farmers and their families turned out to help with our T-shirt raffle and to pass out farm-stand brochures.”

LIFB is also using grant monies to do onair promotions with radio station WALK.

“We had more than 200 people call in to get farmstand promotional packets the first week,” says Beccaria, “and more than 500 the second time we did it.”

LIFB is aggressive in seeking financial support for its agricultural promotion work.

“We owe our gratitude to state senator Kenneth P. LaValle,” says Gergela. “Every year he finds about $25,000 in state funding— one year as much as $50,000—to help us promote Long Island agriculture.”

Given the importance of the task, that’s no small potatoes.