SB681 Summary

• Establishes a temporary food security task force at the University of Hawaii's national disaster preparedness training center to develop an emergency food plan for catastrophic events, emergencies, or quarantines that would close state harbors and airports.

• Task force shall be chaired by the executive director of the national disaster preparedness training center and include the adjutant general, board of land and natural resources chair, civil defense vice director, agribusiness development corporation chair, college of tropical agriculture dean, and agriculture board chair.

• Task force shall identify cultivable public and private lands, irrigation needs, optimal crops for nutrition and harvest cycles, current agricultural operations that could assist, and feasibility of public orchards and planting 5,000 fruit trees in state and city parks within five years.

• Task force shall develop plans for food distribution, home gardens with emergency seed packets, using commercial fishermen and wild game populations, vulnerable population identification, emergency food drops, and farm security.

• Task force shall submit interim report no later than 20 days before the 2014 legislative session and final report no later than 20 days before the 2015 session; task force ceases to exist on June 30, 2015.

• Appropriates unspecified funds from general revenues for fiscal years 2013-2014 and 2014-2015 to be expended by the University of Hawaii; effective July 1, 2050.