Hawaii’s dry spell predicted to linger through May | The Honolulu Advertiser

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Even the wettest spot in Hawai’i — Mount Wai’ale’ale — wasn’t so wet last year as the state experienced below-normal rainfall in all but a few spots.

Rain gauges at the Kaua’i mountaintop measured 308 inches in 2009, 73 percent of normal levels, and a scant 3 inches in December, only 7 percent of normal. It was Mount Wai’ale’ale’s third-driest December on record, according to National Weather Service data.

In Honolulu, only the O’ahu Forest National Wildlife Refuge experienced above-normal rainfall in 2009 — 214 inches. Totals for most sites in central and west O’ahu were less than 50 percent of their annual averages.

The December rainfall numbers were even worse, with most O’ahu gauges measuring a third or less of normal rainfall averages, a trend that has continued into the new year.

The U.S. Drought Monitor reports that 99 percent of the state is experiencing "abnormally dry" or worse conditions, compared with 37 percent at the same time last year. More than a third of the state is suffering "severe to exceptional" drought.

On Maui and the Big Island, the U.S. Department of Agriculture last month designated the two counties as natural disaster areas so farmers could seek relief for crop losses.

Local stock experts wary of market once again – Hawaii Business – Starbulletin

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By Dave Segal

Hawaii investment experts aren’t expecting too much from the U.S. stock market in 2010.

Then again, they didn’t anticipate too much last year either, and the three major indexes posted total returns ranging from about 23 to 45 percent.

So with that as a backdrop, four local stock experts are back at it again for the ninth annual Star-Bulletin survey of best investment ideas.

Barry Hyman, vice president-managing team for the Maui branch of FIM Group Ltd., will seek to defend his title after an impressive 125 percent gain in his hypothetical $20,000 portfolio. That’s heady stuff for a self-proclaimed value investor, who calls the overall market fully valued and expects a lot of churning this year but little, if any, forward progress.

He said if there’s anything that was proven in the last two years it’s that passive investing in diversified index funds is "a loser’s game during volatile periods."

"While 2010 will likely have little upside for the major U.S. market indexes, there will be lots of money to be made both in the U.S. and, especially, overseas by astute investors through selective investing," he said.

Hyman is joined once again in the contest by Kauai’s Norm Caris (up 97.9 percent in 2009), managing director-institutional sales for Caris and Co.; Richard Dole (up 37.8 percent), chief investment officer of Honolulu investment adviser Dole Capital LLC; and Dwight Melton (up 29.5 percent), co-founder of the Hawaii Stocks and Options group.

The participants may have long or short positions in the investments they recommend.

"Selection is key," Hyman said. "Just investing in entire markets or sectors ‘dumbs down’ portfolios. Each sector will likely have winners and mediocre performers. Investors need to own the well-managed undervalued winning companies in these sectors."
Hyman said the best sectors to invest in this year are health care, energy, food/agriculture and companies that benefit from the emerging economies of Asia, east Europe, Africa and South and Central America.

Hawaii and Related Agriculture Daily Charts for the week ending 01-22-2010

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The annual charts have bee updated. CLICK HERE to view. The 360 day comparative price, line and histogram charts, page has been updated also. CLICK HERE to view.

Maui Land and Pineapple (MLP) 01-22-2010
Maui Land and Pineapple (MLP)

Calavo Growers (CVGW) 01-22-2010
Calavo Growers (CVGW)

Alexander and Baldwin (ALEX) 01-22-2010
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Monsanto (MON) 01-22-2010
Monsanto (MON)

Syngenta (SYT) 01-22-2010
Syngenta (SYT)

DUPONT E I DE NEM (DD) 01-22-2010
Syngenta (SYT)

Central Oahu subdivision would create 5,000 homes – Hawaii Business – Starbulletin

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Castle & Cooke needs approval to build its $2.2 billion community on agricultural lands

By Allison Schaefers

Castle & Cooke has asked the state Land Use Commission for permission to convert agricultural lands north of Costco in Waipio into its $2.2 billion master-planned communities Koa Ridge Makai and Waiawa.

The developer, which topped off a 16,000-home, 40-year project in Mililani in 2008, now seeks to reclassify nearly 768 acres in Waipio and Waiawa from an agricultural to an urban designation. Such a ruling would allow Castle & Cooke to move forward on its long-stalled project, which has been planned since the 1990s.

Koa Ridge calls for 3,500 housing units and 500,000 square feet of commercial development, an elementary school, parks, recreation centers and churches to be built on about 575 acres makai of the H-2 freeway. At Waiawa, Castle & Cooke would build another 1,500 homes on 191 acres mauka of the H-2 near Ka Uka Boulevard. The development, which would offer homes from $200,000 to $1 million, would bring more affordable housing to Central Oahu, create some 2,500 jobs and create millions in state and county revenue, said Bruce Barrett, executive vice president of Castle & Cooke.

If the commission agrees to the request, the developer still must go before the city to get subdivision approval, but it will have met all major hurdles, as the LUC approved Castle & Cooke’s environmental impact statement in June. With all approvals, the company could break ground at the end of 2012.

A series of public hearings, which could take months and no doubt will reopen old wounds and mend some old fences, began yesterday. The LUC tentatively approved the project in 2002; however, community opposition and legal battles sent Castle & Cooke back to the drawing board after a state judge ruled that a formal environmental review was necessary before the subdivision, with its planned medical and commercial development, could be built.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR – The Maui News

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SUPPORT NEW COMPANY BY BUYING PINEAPPLE

Well, it’s a new year and the first thing I would like to do is say thank you to all involved in the new Haliimaile Pineapple venture. Kudos to all for keeping this legacy alive and the jobs that go with it.

I will buy one pineapple a week, and I urge the rest of the Maui community to do so as well. We must help prove that agriculture can thrive here on Maui, so I ask all of you to join me in this.

Big mahalo to the Erdmans and everyone involved.

Just one pineapple a week: I will, will you?

Tim Garcia

Makawao

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR – Mauinews.com | News, Sports, Jobs, Visitor’s Information – The Maui News

Monsanto grants help county schools, 4-H’ers – The Maui News

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KIHEI – Three Molokai and Maui schools plus Maui 4-H’ers received a total of $4,620 from the Monsanto Hawaii Science Education Fund for science and robotics programs.

The Maui County grants were part of $12,000 distributed statewide to 14 schools and organizations.

"It’s gratifying to see how excited our youth get as they learn about their world – how it works, how it touches our lives each day, how much there is to know and explore," said Paul Koehler, community affairs director for Monsanto Hawaii."Through this grant program, we hope to open up wonderful experiences for dynamic learning."

State ag groups clarify their support for atrazine | Abilene Reflector-Chronicle (KS)

January 16, 2010

Agricultural groups from Kansas and across the nation signed onto a letter to EPA clarifying growers’ support for atrazine. The letter was sent to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson today. Earlier this month, environmental activist groups submitted a letter to EPA saying growers oppose the use of atrazine. "It is truly disheartening when political agendas attempt to overturn scientific process," the letter states. "Such is the case in the January 5th letter submitted to the EPA by a handful of special interest groups misrepresenting themselves as the voice of the agriculture community in an attempt to negate the overwhelming support and confidence in the herbicide atrazine and to gain media attention for themselves."

Jere White, executive director of the Kansas corn and grain sorghum growers associations said farmers have been involved in EPA’s reviews of atrazine since the mid-1990s. The groups that signed the letter in support of atrazine represent a very large number of farmers and agricultural producers.

"Over 50 national, state, and local grower and agricultural groups signed on to this letter which reaffirms their support of the use of atrazine. These groups represent hundreds of thousands of farmers from Hawaii to Pennsylvania," White said.

NYSE: ML&P isn’t meeting listing levels – The Maui News

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NYSE: ML&P isn’t meeting listing levels

Company has 45 days to offer a way to meet exchange standards

WAILUKU – The New York Stock Exchange has warned Maui Land & Pineapple Co. that it is no longer meeting listing standards.

ML&P announced on Friday that it had received the warning.

The company’s average market capitalization was less than $50 million over a 30-day trading period, and its most recently reported shareholders’ equity was less than $50 million, putting it out of compliance with the stock exchange’s requirements.

Under the NYSE’s procedures, ML&P has 45 days to submit a plan to demonstrate its ability to come back into compliance with the stock exchange’s listing standards within the next 18 months. In the meantime, the company’s common stock will continue to be listed.

In a report filed last month with the Securities and Exchange Commission, ML&P disclosed that auditors updating its annual report in advance of a new stock offering had "substantial doubt" about the company’s ability to stay in business.

The report cited the company’s deep financial losses, weak cash reserves, inability to meet certain financial obligations and a $60 million deficit in shareholder equity as reasons for the auditors’ concerns.

ML&P is hoping to raise up to $25 million in the form of new investment from existing shareholders, an offering that is now pending approval from the SEC.

NYSE: ML&P isn’t meeting listing levels – Mauinews.com | News, Sports, Jobs, Visitor’s Information – The Maui News

Asia Times | Surviving against the Odds by S Ann Dunham

BOOK REVIEW

She had a dream

Surviving against the Odds

by S Ann Dunham

Reviewed by Dinesh Sharma

Almost 20 years after she completed her doctoral dissertation and 15 years after she prematurely passed away due to cancer, S Ann Dunham’s dream to publish her life’s work has finally been realized.

Due partly to the efforts of an esteemed group of economic and cultural anthropologists, who worked with her for more than 30 years, and in no small measure to the new-found fame of herchildren, Barack Obama and Maya Soetoro-Ng, her research in the remote villages of Java has found a growing audience that even she could not have imagined.

Caught between the Beat generation and the hippies, Dunham was a product of the radical ideals of the 1960s and raised her children with the same idealism and values, recalled Alice Dewey, professor of anthropology at the University of Hawaii, who was a mentor and friend of Dunham.

When US President Barack Obama accepted the Noble Peace Prize, he fulfilled one of the cherished dreams of his mother to be a peacemaker. "She would be so proud of him right now," said Alice Dewey as she became tearful. "Ann Dunham was becoming well known in her own right and getting recognized for her development work before she passed away.