The U.S. Department of Agriculture released projections for the upcoming 2012-13 season, and indications are that the crop will be down 14 percent nationwide.

In its sixth year of growing Asian vegetables, Mont Saint-Hilaire-based Organzo is looking to add an American grower to its team. “We were recently in Georgia looking to add an American grower, it will be smaller acreage to begin but the goal is to achieve year-round growing,” said Julie Nichols, president and founder of Organzo. “We are also looking for additional growers in the U.S.”

Bloomington, CA-based Index Fresh, a grower-owned packing, marketing and shipping company, announced that KEITH BLANCHARD has joined its field staff, effective July 31.

Columbia Marketing International, headquartered in Wenatchee, WA, will market a quality pear crop this season. “There will be plenty of promotable pears,” said Vice President of Marketing Bob Mast. His assessment comes on the heels of information about a July 20 storm cell that caused damage to fruit-growing regions in Washington.

According to Mr. Mast, Washington’s coming apple crop will be affected the storm. He said there may be some surface damage to the skins of some pear varieties. But he expects some of the blemishing will be resolved as the fruit matures.

Calavo Growers Inc. announced the completion of the expansion of fresh avocado packing operations at its Uruapan, Michoacán, Mexico, facility to keep pace with strong consumer demand.

The company, a global avocado-industry leader and an expanding provider of value-added fresh food, said that the upgrades provide Calavo's Uruapan packinghouse with the capacity to pack at least 6 million pounds of fruit per week -- a 200 percent increase over prior output.

In the mid-1990s apple growers in California were producing 10 million boxes of apples annually. Today, growers there produce between 2.5 million boxes and 3 million boxes, and that number has held as about average over the past several years.

Alex Ott, executive director of the California Apple Commission in Fresno, CA, told The Produce News that in the 1990s, mostly Fuji and Granny Smith apples were produced in the state.