A devastating hailstorm that tore across New York state Monday, June 16, could reduce the state's apple crop by as much as 60 percent.

"The storm swept across western New York," Jim Allen, president of the New York Apple Association in Fishers, NY, told The Produce News. "It moved from east of Buffalo across the main fruit belt area and hit south of Syracuse and the Hudson Valley. It was like the storm had radar for apples."

The U.S. Food & Drug Administration indicated that one traceback in the foodborne illness outbreak linked to red round and Roma/plum tomatoes is complete to certain farms in both Mexico and Florida, but stressed that the contamination may not have occurred on the farm, according to a June 20 Issue Alert from the Produce Marketing Association.

FDA is sending investigators to Florida and Mexico to look at the entire distribution chain to determine where contamination might have occurred. FDA indicated it believes the tomatoes were contaminated at a single point.

Table grape growers in the San Joaquin Valley generally are expecting their earliest varieties to start a week or more later this year than they did last year. Some call it "later than normal"; others say that last year was early and that this year is closer to normal. But with just a few exceptions, most growers who have grapes in early districts do not expect to start harvesting in any significant volume before the Fourth of July.

Almost without exception, growers are expecting good volume and good to exceptional quality.

If good things come in threes, then continued success is in store for ENZA's Jazz Apple Cycling Team as it speeds across North America on its third consecutive racing tour that started in May and runs through August.

Six months after naming Allen Vangelos to the position of president and chief executive officer on an interim basis, the owners and board of directors of Sun World International LLC have made the appointment permanent.

The announcement was made in a June 12 press release following a nationwide search for a candidate to fill the position on a permanent basis. "Sun World's board and management team are delighted with Al's decision to accept the position on a permanent basis," board Chairman Christopher Parker said in the release.