Posts Tagged “shipping”
Strawberries
While strawberry shipments from Ventura County are in a seasonal decline, berry volume from both the Santa Maria area and the Salinas/Watsonville district are on the rise.
Overall this season, I’ve been disappointed in the quality of California strawberries, both in taste and appearance. As long as your receiver knows what they are having delivered, then it should reduce your chances of claims or rejections. Hopefully quality will improve with the transition to northern shipping areas.
Studies have shown if your load has pallets with sealed bags from Tectrol with the CO2 modified atmosphere, you will have berries with better arrivals and extended shelf life.
California has refined growing methods on more than 40,000 acres and have improved yields by 44 percent since 1990, but you can’t control Mother Nature. About 90 percent of USA grown fresh strawberries are from California.
The Salinas/Watsonville district is easily the state’s most important when it comes to strawberry shipments, with loads amounting to nearly half of California’s production.
During a year, Salinas/Watsonville ships nearly 20,000 truck load equivalents of strawberries, with the Santa Maria district moving nearly 11,000 truck load equivalents and Southern Californa shipping over 12,000 truck load equivalents.
Blueberries
Although a few California growers began harvesting and shipping early blueberry varieties last March, the bulk of loadings occur in May and June, with the season ending by July.
California is now shipping blueberries and all the signs point to good volume and quality. The Golden state this year is expected to exceed the 1,100 truck load equivalents of “blues” shipped in 2012.
California is home to 80 blueberry producers and 20 handlers, and ranks fifth nationally blueberry shipments.
Blueberry volume is light, but seasonally increasing from the southern and central disticts of California. Raspberries are in light volume from Ventura County.
Salinas strawberries and vegetables – grossing about $7500 to New York City.
The food and pharmaceutical industries are rapidly moving towards 
returnable transport items (RTIs) and reusable plastic containers (RPCs) for shipping goods through the supply chain. Why? They’re lighter, more durable and now can be made intelligent. By adding temperature monitoring capabilities directly into the RTIs and RPCs, growers, manufacturers, shippers and retailers can both track and monitor the quality of their products as they move through the cold chain to improve quality and operational efficiency while lowering costs.
Press Release: Intelleflex
(Editor’s Note: This also can provide protection from claims for owner operators and transporters)
During the 2011-12 shipping season, truckers hauled nealy 35,000 truckload 
loads of Colorado potatoes to destinations thoughout the USDA. The Rocky Mountain state has started shipments for the 2012-13 season, although volume is very light.
Harvesting began in August with some farming operations, but others are just getting underway with digging potatoes. San Luis Valley potato acreage is up slightly this year and totals 55,100 acres. While this is certainly significant, it doesn’t compare to th 72,000 acres planted a decade ago. 70 years ago colo had 175 grower/shippers. now there are about 20. although fewer, they are much larger operations.
Some growers started harvesting in August, and others are beginning in early-to-mid September, depending on location and conditions.
The San Luis Valley produces 92% of Colorado’s potatoes, with the remaining spuds coming primarily from the Greeley area. Colorado is ranked in the top five potato producing areas in the USA, both in acres planted and production. Colorado is the number 2 fresh potato shipper in the country.
Location of the San Luis Valley is south, central CO. It is found southwest of Pueblo, CO, with the heart of its potato shipments coming from the Monte Vista and Center, CO area.
85% of the valley’s potatoes are russets, although it produces about 60 different variets of potatoes in all.