Truck rates from west to east are currently between $8,000 and $9,000, and it is possible that the peak of the season in July and August may bring a five- figure rate for the first time in history.

Imagination Farms continues to grow with the addition of "Pixie Sweet" snacking mini peppers from Frank's Distributing/Bionova Produce in Nogales, AZ.

The "Disney Garden" brand Pixie Sweet peppers will be available in one-pint clamshells featuring the hallmark Tinkerbell packaging. All packaging will carry reminder copy of "Fairy Fun Snack" to tell kids and moms that these small peppers are perfect for snacking. The peppers will be available year round starting in July.

Scottsdale, AZ-based Martori Farms, a grower-shipper specializing in cantaloupe, watermelons and mixed melons, recently expanded its specialty melon program and added two industry veterans to its sales staff.

Most of the major fast-food chains were starting to put sliced tomatoes back on their products by June 18, and Mexican tomatoes from FDA-approved areas in Baja California were being shipped again. It appears as if the tomato scare will not have the residual effect on consumers that the spinach crisis had two years ago.

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.