Posts Tagged “honeydew”
Entering the lightest season volume wise for produce loads, it’s not uncommon for multiple pick ups and drops to fill out the trailer. Pick ups starting in southern California may extend to the California desert, Yuma and perhaps even Nogales. Changes for the better are occuring at the Arizona, Mexico border that should improve produce crossings in the USA and reduce delays for loadings at the many Nogales warehouses.
The Mariposa port was built in the 1970s, designed to handled 400 trucks crossing into Arizona daily. Over the years changes have increased the truck count to around 1600 to 1800 a day. In the past an estimated 25 percent of the trucks crossing the border into Arizona were delayed because of gridlock on the Mariposa Road (State Route 189), which connects the port to I-19. Numerous stop lights on the state route often contribute to the delays.
In 2009 a $220 million expansion of the port was started and is scheduled for completion in 2014. This should increase traffic capabilities to 4,000 to 5,000 trucks a day crossing the border in Nogales.
Meanwhile, there is light volume of watermelon, honeydew, squash, bell peppers, tomatoes and other items crossing the border from Mexico, it will be another month of so before the volume really improves.
Nogales produce is grossing about $3400 to Chicago, about $5800 to New York.
With a glut of tomatoes due to over production both from Florida and Mexico,
tomatoes should be reasonably priced in your local supermarket. I emphasize “should be” as retailers too often love to see overproduction “blood baths” allowing them to buy product cheap, but too often these retailers are very reluctant to pass the savings on to the consumer.
Another good buy should be Chilean grapes. I’ve found the red seedless grapes to be of excellent quality, although often lacking in size. The green seedless grapes I’ve tasted have been a little tart, but not bad.
If you are looking for honeydew, expect to pay a premium as supplies from both Mexico and Central America are light. I find honeydew this time of year too often lacking in taste….Asian pears are a favorite of mine. They are a little pricey anytime, but expect this to be even more so now. Supplies are shifting from the U.S. to Chile, where the crop may be off as much as 15 percent.
My experience thus far with strawberries has been kind of erractic. I have had some fruit that didn’t look that good, but had better taste than some of the berries with great color. It’s hard to figure out.