Imports of Aspargus from Peru has had steady, consistent volume, but more volume will be arriving soon.
The USDA reported Peruvian asparagus accounted for 37% of the total supply in the U.S. during the week of July 7-13. Other suppliers to the U.S. market in mid-July included Mexico, which accounted for 48% of the total supply, and Canada, which accounted for 4% of the total supply.
Crystal Valley Foods of Miami, FL notes there has been less volume this time of the year due to weather factors. To make up for lower volume from Peru, the company has been sourcing product from Mexico.
Although asparagus is imported from Peru 52 weeks a year, peak supply is typically from about mid-September through November.
Crystal Valley Foods receives most of its Peruvian asparagus imports at Miami International Airport (when asparagus is flown in), as well as the port of Miami.
Its primary asparagus customers are in foodservice and retail chains.
Another shipping season of quality red, white and yellow potatoes from growers in Washington and Oregon is expected.
The 2024 harvest started in late July for some growers, but will not get underway until early September for others, which is typical.
USDA estimates that Washington produced 99.7 million hundredweight of potatoes in 2023, about 10% of which was destined for fresh market.
Total potato production this year will be down due to a reduction in acres planted, according to the Washington Potato Commission of Moses Lake, WA.
About 16,000 fewer acres were planted this year. With excellent weather during the growing season yields per acres are expected to increase.
An overall 8% decline in Washington’s potato production is expected by the commission compared to last year.
Total potato acreage in Washington is projected to be down 10% to 12%.
Growers in the state have planted an estimated 144,000 acres of potatoes, of which about 16,000 acres are for fresh market.
Oregon’s growers produced about 27.4 million hundredweight of potatoes in 2023, according to USDA.
The Oregon Potato Commission of Portland predicts about 10% of that volume is for fresh market.
Oregon grows about 43,000 acres of potatoes.
Double-N Potatoes of Burlington, WA ships red, yellow, white potatoes and purple potatos.
Harvest gets underway the first or second week of September, volume expected to be similar to last year.
Double-N Potatoes ships from September until the end of April.
Valley Pride Sales LLC, also based in Burlington, will start its 2024 harvest in early September.
The company, which ships potatoes year-round, has white, red and yellow potatoes and some small potatoes for consumer packs.
Eagle Eye Produce of Iona, ID ships potatoes the year-round potato out of Mattawa, WA. It’s 2024 harvest has just got started.
The company’s acreage will be down this year because of crop rotations and an industrywide oversupply with grower returns below the cost of production.
Potandon Produce of Pasco, WA, expects to have a higher-quality crop of russet potatoes this year as last season had its ups and downs. A more consistent crop is seen this year.
Potandon’s harvest started in late July. The company ships out of Washington the year around.
Guatemala remained the primary exporter to the United States in 2023, reaching a record export value of $280 million.
Most melons consumed in the United States are grown domestically, but imports are capturing a growing share of the fresh melon market.
The market share of imported melons has increased significantly over the decades – from an average share of less than 10% during the 1980s and 1990s to about 37% in recent years.
Melon imports rose for the third consecutive year to a record high of 3.1 billion pounds, with ample supplies from Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico.
In 2023, the estimated domestic availability of melons was 7.54 billion pounds, up 1% from the previous year. But, the import share of domestic availability for all melons reached 41.4% in 2023, the highest on record.
Increases in watermelon and honeydew supplies helped offset a decline in domestic cantaloupe production, and watermelon continued to account for over two-thirds of per capita melon availability.
Cantaloupe imports increased 6% in 2023. Over the last three years, 65% of fresh cantaloupe imports have come from Guatemala, the rest of the variety imports come from Honduras and Mexico.
Between July 2023 and January 2024, over 90% of U.S. honeydew imports came from Mexico, 48%, and Guatemala, 45%. The remaining 7% came from Honduras.
Watermelon import volume also increased in 2023. Most watermelon imports are seedless varieties from Mexico and Guatemala. While watermelon makes up 58% of melon import volume, the import share of domestic availability for watermelons is lower than cantaloupe or honeydew.
Ontario may be known for its bustling greenhouse industry, but growers of field-grown vegetables in the Canadian provience have made their own mark and are providing good volume this summer.
Ontario Potato Distributors Inc. of Alliston, Ontario launched its 2024 season with yellow potatoes the week of July 15, which were soon followed by white potatoes.
Ontario Potato ships year-round mostly to retailers but also has some foodservice and wholesale customers.
Procyk Farms (1994) Ltd. of Wilsonville, Ontario began harvesting in early June, a little earlier than usual because of warmer-than-normal weather.
The firm’s product line includes tomatoes, roma tomatoes, sauce tomatoes, red and savoy cabbage, sweet corn, zucchini and red, yellow and green bell peppers. All commodities were shipping by the second week of July.
Procyk Farms will ship until the first fall frost, which usually occurs by the Canadian Thanksgiving, which will be October 14 this year. Volume will be similar to last year.
Sweet corn is the major crop grown by Rouge River Farms in Gormley, Ontario. The company, which started in Ontario with a few acres in the late 1980s, now may be the largest fresh-market sweet corn grower on the East Coast.
Rouge River also has 8,000 acres of green beans, making it one of the largest growers of green beans on the East Coast. This will be the first year the company is growing green beans in Ontario.
The firm also has sweet corn and green bean programs in Florida, Georgia and Virginia.
Exeter Produce of Exeter, Ontario will have an extensive line of field vegetables this summer. Some of the items include broccoli, sweet corn, hard squash, garlic, rutabagas, green beans, cabbage, wrapped cabbage and wrapped broccoli as well as its new napa cabbage product and several new kinds of chili peppers.
The company grows on about 6,000 acres. Most of the local summer items from Exeter Produce will finish by early October, then the company will turn to squash, cabbage, rutabagas and heartier items until Christmas.
The fourth-generation grower ships most of its product to retailers and foodservice operators, 60% of which are in Canada with the remainder in the U.S.
Scotlynn Group of Vittoria, Ontario kicked off its sweet corn season the second week of July.
The company will ship pumpkins from Labor Day weekend through the end of October.
Sweet corn shipments should continue until mid-September.
The company grows 15,000 acres of vegetables in Ontario, Florida and Georgia and ships to retailers on the East Coast and West Coast of Canada and mostly to customers east of the Mississippi in the U.S.
According to a research published by Concordia University’s Department of Health, Kinesiology and Applied Physiology in the Physical Activity and Nutrition journal, consuming cranberry can improve running speed and aerobic performance in trained runners thanks to faster muscle reoxygenation rates.
The trials monitored the performance of 14 trained distance runners that ingested a cranberry supplement for 28 days.
The research found that constant supplementation led to noticeable improvements in their performance, running speed improvement, and muscle recuperation, thanks to faster reoxygenation rates.
Athletes ran two times trials over three separate visits, one 1,500-meter and the other a 400-meter, in the second test they were given a cranberry supplement and then told to continue ingesting it for 28 days.
This is due to the fruit being rich in polyphenols, an antioxidant which protects the body from free radical effects caused by strenuous exercise.
According to Concordia university’s paper, the fruit is also easily accessible for others who might want to try for themselves since “they’re indigenous to and a major industrial crop for Quebec.” According to Statistics Canada, the province produces roughly 60% of Canada’s cranberry yield.
Some of my earliest memories involve fresh produce – watching cardboard crates of plump tomatoes and glistening peppers being unloaded at the docks of my family’s wholesale produce warehouse, sampling sweet berries, and vigilantly checking for damaged products beside my grandfather, father, and uncle. As the third generation of a produce family, fresh produce was a major part of my childhood.
At the time, I simply enjoyed the deliciousness of fresh fruits and vegetables and thought little of where they were grown or how they reached my kitchen table. As an adult, I now find myself fascinated by the process. How long does it take to pick a crop and get it from the farm to a customer’s table? What practices utilized during transport best preserve product quality? A great majority of our country’s produce comes from California and Mexico, with their ideal growing climates and lengthy growing seasons. In 2022 alone, 590,906 truckloads of imported produce were shipped from Mexico to the U.S. in 40,000-pound loads. How can so much perishable freight remain fresh when traveling across the country?
Danny Mandel, founder and former CEO of SunFed in Nogales, Arizona, has over 30 years of experience in the produce industry and was able to answer these questions. Mandel reports that it takes one day to pick, pack, and load a fresh crop and another two to five days to reach its final destination. What keeps fragile produce so fresh after this transport time? It requires growers to harvest produce at the optimal time and package it in sturdy containers that allow air to circulate while preventing bruising. Refrigerated van drivers and transport companies further extend product longevity with stringent adherence to temperature requirements – which vary by fruit and vegetable variety. Following temperature requirements on bill of lading instructions and carefully monitoring temperature gauges extend freshness and prevent the formation of mold. Furthermore, practices such as loading and unloading quickly help keep any adverse outside weather conditions or drastically different temperatures from damaging the product.
According to the USDA, Postmaster General Albert Burleson launched the Farm to Table program in 1914. The program consisted of picking up produce and other farm fresh items and delivering the goods as quickly as possible to retailers, ultimately reaching America’s kitchen tables with healthy products still as fresh as possible. Previously, unconsumed produce was destined for the compost heap. Now, growers could sell farm goods for financial gain to more consumers. The advent of temperature-controlled freight further made it possible to deliver products in a timely manner.
With the high demand for fresh produce, consumers can expect the industry to continue to advance in delivering produce as quickly as possible. Greenhouses could allow produce to be grown in colder states to lessen the stress of relying on warmer areas to support our heavy produce consumption and further decrease the transport time from farm to table. There will always be a need to transport the product, but more growing areas across the country would mean increased product freshness by reducing transport time.
Getting produce from the farm to your table as quickly as possible makes for a healthy and enjoyable meal. After 110 years, Postmaster Burleson’s Farm to Table idea continues to make great strides and improve consumer culinary options. The next time you stop by your local grocery store for salad fixings, keep in mind the growers who cultivated a beautiful crop, the dedicated drivers who quickly and safely transported thousands of pounds of product, and even the transportation broker who monitored the delivery of your load.
*****
Kenneth Cavallaro, Jr. is a carrier manager in the Boston office. He began his career at the Allen Lund Company in February of 2019. Kenneth has been in the transportation industry since May of 1999. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from Salem State University.
The USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service said its latest almond forecast is a 2.8 billion meat pounds, which is 13% higher than last year’s crop of 2.47 billion meat pounds but down 7% from its May forecast.
The USDA said the forecast is based on reporting from 1.38 million bearing acres.
The forecast for nonpareil, which is 39% of the state’s total almond production, is 1.1 billion meat pounds; that is 17% higher than last year’s 941 million meat pounds.
USDA said these figures are due to favorable weather conditions during bloom, which began the second week in February and finished by the middle of March. USDA also reports bee hours to be higher than last year.
California’s fig shipments got an early start this year thanks to hot summer temperatures.
The California Fresh Fig Growers Association reports the main harvest started a couple of weeks earlier than usual, on July 15, and the organization expects the fruit to be “beautiful and plentiful well into the fall.”
The organization notes California Fresh Figs are already available to be shipped to retailers and that shipping numbers are finally returning to pre-pandemic status. The first crop delivered the first Mission figs of the season in May-June. Mission figs have purplish-black skin and a deep earthy flavor.
The main crop, now underway, is delivering other varieties such as Brown Turkeys, Missions, and Sierras. Additional varieties will continue to become available through November. The organization expects that nearly 10 million pounds of figs will be harvested this year, but won’t know the final numbers until November.
CEO of the California Fresh Fig Growers Association, Karla Stockli, says they expect a bountiful harvest after years of drought and fires. “The orchards are very healthy which align with the increase in demand,” she added. “The quality of California Fresh Figs this season is fantastic. They are plump, juicy and delicious.”
Fig growers are also investing in acquiring more hectares to increase the level of production.
California Fresh Figs are only available seasonally, but California Dried Figs are a year-round staple, offering the same nutrition and taste benefits.
Michigan growers are national leaders for several specialty crops. The state ships fruits and vegetables every month of the year, with the peak volume in August and September.
Apples: In 2022, 1.36 billion pounds of apples were harvested in Michigan, ranking second in the nation. About 50% of the harvest was used for processing, yielding a farm value of $108 million. Fresh market apples account for a farm value of $34 million at 707 million pounds. There are more than 14.95 million apple trees in commercial production, covering 34,500 acres on 775 family-run farms. Orchards are trending to super high-density planting (approximately 1,000 or more trees per acre), which come into production and bring desirable varieties to market quickly.
Asparagus: Michigan ranks first in the nation for asparagus production, producing up to 26 million pounds annually. Michigan growers harvest approximately 9,500 acres annually.
Blueberries: In an average year, Michigan blueberry farmers produce more than 70 million pounds of more than 30 varieties of highbush blueberries. More than 50% of all Michigan blueberries are shipped to the fresh market. Michigan’s blueberry crop is harvested from more than 14,000 acres. Michigan blueberries are grown, harvested, packed and processed by 500 family farms annually, contributing more than $130 million to the state’s economy.
Cucumbers: Michigan ranks first nationally in the production of cucumbers for pickling. In 2022, Michigan produced 216,726 tons of pickling cucumbers with a value of $45.5 million. In addition, the state produced 53.6 million pounds of cucumbers for the fresh market worth $17.7 million.
Grapes: Michigan uses more than 93,000 tons of grapes for the production of wine and juice. Michigan has 10,900 acres of vines on 390 farms, making Michigan the eighth-largest overall grape-producing state in the nation.
Onions: A majority of Michigan onion production occurs in south central and southern Michigan in the counties of Allegan, Barry, Eaton, Ionia, Kent, Newaygo, Ottawa and Van Buren. Michigan onion production in 2022 was 85 million pounds, with a total value of $18.7 million.
Peaches: Most Michigan peaches are grown in the west central to southwest corner, close to Lake Michigan, with additional production in the east along Lake St. Clair and in the northwest Grand Rapids area. In 2022, Michigan produced more than 23 million pounds of peaches valued at more than $20.1 million. Michigan’s Red Haven peaches are famous throughout the country, with recent new Michigan varieties including the southwest Michigan Flamin’ Fury and Stellar peach series gaining popularity.
Potatoes: Michigan is ranked ninth in production of potatoes, generating $2.45 billion in economic impact in 2022 and nearly 1.65 billion pounds of potatoes harvested from as far south as Monroe County to as far north as Iron County in the Upper Peninsula. Michigan is the nation’s leading producer of potatoes for potato chip processing. Montcalm County has more harvested acres than any other county in Michigan.
Pumpkins: In 2022, Michigan generated $16.4 million from the production of 93.1 million pounds of pumpkins. In 2022, Michigan produced 164 million pounds of squash for fresh or processed use, totaling $39.5 million. Michigan leads the nation in the production of squash.
Snap beans: Michigan snap beans are grown in green, purple, and yellow varieties throughout the July through September season. Michigan produces fresh and processed snap beans. In 2022, 16,800 acres were planted with 16,500 harvested, amounting to a total value of $31 million, while 21.4 million pounds of fresh beans totaling $15.6 million were sold.
Sweet corn: Michigan sweet corn is enjoyed throughout the state in several varieties. On average, Michigan produces 86 million pounds of sweet corn for the fresh market worth $21.8 million.
Tomatoes: Michigan grows tomatoes for both fresh and processed uses. On average, Michigan produces 120,100 tons of tomatoes for processing and 74 million pounds of tomatoes for fresh market, with a total value is $48.4 millio
In the 2023 season peach and nectarine shipments in the United States fell to its lowest level since the early ’80s, with colder temperatures delaying bloom and later freezes damaging the fruit.
The USDA reports the downward trend started in 2011-12, when production fell below a million tons in 2013-14 for the first time in decades, where it has since remained. U.S. output declined 30% between 2013-14 and 2022-23, with volumes dropping 300,000 tons to 650,000.
Higher temperatures in Georgia and South Carolina could improve yields for those states. However, IMP News reports in southern Illinois, some orchards continue struggling.
Rendleman Orchards in Alto Pass and Flamm Orchards, southeast of St. Louis, are seeing better volume.
Flamm Orchard’s reports is pleased is with the crop’s current condition, adding they are seeing good production levels.
However, Eckert’s Inc. in Belleville, had another off year, with about 50% production. The area saw subzero temperatures in mid-January, leading to a dip in production.
