The Idaho Potato Commission has stepped up its global marketing efforts with the addition of Traci Hiebert as its new international marketing director.

“I think one of the things that makes us successful is that we are year-round suppliers of garlic, both organic and conventional, from all growing regions,” said James (Jim) Provost, managing partner of I Love Produce LLC in Kelton, PA.

“We try to have a combination of supply areas for people that prefer non-Chinese garlic, which would include, California, Argentina and Mexico,” he said. “If we combine those three supply areas, that gives us a year-round supply of in-season, new-crop Chinese garlic.”

There are “some fun things going on” at Index Fresh Inc. this year, according to Dana Thomas, president of the company. One of those is a new bagging program called “AvoBuddies,” which was rolled out to help move the abundance of small fruit being harvested in California this spring

When buyer-segment demand spurred Tanimura & Antle to reintroduce it's field-fresh packaged leaf lettuce, the Salinas-based company had a trick up its sleeve, or at least on its packaging: a personal trip from T&A's fields through its shipping process, into the grocery store and then the kitchen.

It is significant that while there are some 25,000 acres of farmland in California, mostly in the San Joaquin Valley, devoted to garlic production, there are also some 14,000 acres in the valley that have been taken out of production due to the presence of a devastating and persistent soil-borne disease called white rot with the expectation that garlic may never be planted in those fields again.

Mission Produce Inc., based in Oxnard, CA, has hired Robb Bertels as its new director of strategic marketing.