Tong Engineering has announced the latest addition to its recent series of new product developments, with the launch of a new, all-electric box tipper; the E-TIP.
The next generation E-TIP box tipper is built upon a patent-pending design which features an innovatively designed crop-retaining lid for the gentlest handling, alongside an energy-efficient all-electric drive system.
“We are very proud to offer a complete range of box handling solutions to growers and processors worldwide, all of which are designed to ensure the gentlest handling and dependable performance across a variety of applications, throughput requirements and budgets,” says Edward Tong, Managing Director at Tong Engineering. “We are delighted to launch the new flagship E-TIP box tipper which delivers on our promise of the gentlest handling and combines this with the latest all-electric drive technology for an exceptionally advanced machine.”
“What sets our new E-TIP box tipper apart is the way that the box is cradled throughout the tipping process, with a uniquely designed conveyor-belt lid,” says Edward. “This ensures boxes are securely and gently rotated, without any friction or scuffing to crop. The sliding action of the lid ensures gentle transfer of crop from the box to the machine’s forward conveyor, as well as ensuring seamless upward ejection of empty boxes for continuous operation and maximum performance.”
The E-TIP box tipper replaces traditional forward pivot-tipping hydraulics with a box-rotating design, powered by Tong’s Blue Inverter Technology all-electric direct-drive motors.
Optimum safety is also a key feature of the new tipper’s design, with the machine requiring much less forklift movement than traditional box tippers, resulting in a safer working environment. The more continuous loading and unloading process, coupled with fully automatic PLC controlled tipping, results in a high throughput box tipping process, which can be specified to suit a variety of box sizes, depending on requirements.
For more information on Tong’s latest range of handling equipment visit www.tongengineering.com.
Cal-Organic Farms is now shipping organic red bunch carrots from Coachella, California. A division of Grimmway Farms, Cal-Organic is offering the carrots for a limited time. The California-grown carrots are available in 12- and 24-count cases with green tops intact.
The company bills the carrots as an excellent source of vitamin A with sweet flavor. With solid red color through the root, the carrots are favored by shoppers for their colorful appearance and their vibrant presentation on the plate, the company says.
Supplies are expected to last until the end of March.
USDA is exercising enforcement discretion for a temporary period to provide labeling flexibilities to the Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) requirements and allow the re-distribution of food products intended for foodservice to be sold in retail establishments.
COOL is a labeling law that requires retailers to notify their customers with information regarding where certain foods originated. Covered commodities include frozen fruits and vegetables. Ordinarily, commodities subject to COOL requirements are not required to include a country of origin or method of production label when distributed to foodservice, but the labels are required when these foods are sold at retail establishments.
To facilitate the distribution of food to retail establishments from suppliers that have inventory on hand that is labeled for use in restaurants, effective April 20, 2020, and for a period of 60 days, AMS will not take enforcement action against the retail sale of commodities that lack an appropriate country of origin or method of production label, provided that the food does not make any country of origin or method of production claims. Once the 60-day period has ended, COOL designations will once again be required at covered retail establishments.
By allowing this labeling flexibility, food can be diverted from restaurants to retail, ensuring that this food is made available to families around the country and helping restaurants and their suppliers access additional markets, such as grocery stores, that are currently experiencing greater demand. These actions are in line with similar labeling flexibilities allowed by the Food and Drug Administration and USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service.
John Deere, in collaboration with the UAW, the Iowa Department of Homeland Security and the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association, announced today it is producing protective face shields at John Deere Seeding Group in Moline, Illinois. Deere employees will initially produce 25,000 face shields to meet the immediate needs of health-care workers in several of its U.S. manufacturing communities.
Materials and supplies are on order to produce an additional 200,000 face shields. The company is using an open-source design from the University of Wisconsin-Madison for the project and leveraging expertise, skills and innovation of its employee base.
“Our manufacturing and supply management teams, along with our production and maintenance employees, the UAW and our partners have worked tirelessly to ensure we could lend our support and protect our health-care workers during this crisis,” said John May, Chief Executive Officer, Deere & Company. “By working closely with the communities where our employees live and work, we can help support the needs we’ve identified close to home and, as the project expands, address additional, urgent needs across the country.”
John Deere Seeding Group employees are supporting the special project and are utilizing extensive and robust safety measures adopted across the company to safeguard employees.
Several produce organizations have signed onto a letter urging the USDA to develop a $5 billion Produce Market Stabilization Fund to help U.S. produce growers and shippers, and licensed PACA Produce Dealers affected by the sudden collapse of their business due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The seven-page letter details the specifics of the assistance sought from March 1 to June 30.
Here are the highlights:
Help U.S. growers with documented economic losses during this period.
Create a stabilization program for PACA Licensed Produce Dealers who service restaurants, schools and the hospitality industry. They seek economic assistance to help pay their contracts and their growers.
The money would provide emergency economic assistance to the produce supply chain during this time.
The letter also urged the USDA to use already funded stimulus plans ($500 million for WIC and $450 million for child nutrition programs) to prioritize nutrient-dense fresh fruits and vegetables in feeding programs.
Finally, the letter urges USDA to create an ongoing assessment of the COVID-19 economic impact to the produce industry.
To read the letter in full, go here.
Thirty agriculture organizations and businesses yesterday calling on the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) to include agricultural businesses in the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, as intended by Congress in the CARES Act.
The notice on the SBA website currently states applicants must certify they are “not an agricultural enterprise (e.g., farm), other than an aquaculture enterprise, agricultural cooperative or nursery.” Yet, the actual text of the CARES Act does not exclude agriculture producers and states all businesses with fewer than 500 employees can participate in the program.
In a letter to SBA Administrator Jovita Carranza, the agriculture organizations wrote, “Agricultural producers and businesses are critical elements of this nation’s economy and food system. Prior to COVID-19, farmers and ranchers had already experienced a drastic 24-percent decline in net farm income from highs experienced just six years ago. With the further downturn in the economy, agricultural businesses are at risk of closure and may be required to lay off employees.”
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act allocated $350 billion to help small businesses keep workers employed amid the pandemic and economic downturn.
Known as the Paycheck Protection Program, the initiative provides 100% federally guaranteed loans to small businesses.
Importantly, these loans may be forgiven if borrowers maintain their payrolls during the crisis or restore their payrolls afterward.
DOWNLOAD this useful tool from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce entitled, “Coronavirus Emergency Loans: Small Business Guide and Checklist” that explains which companies are eligible for these new loans, what lenders will be looking for from your organization, how much you can borrow, how to have the loan forgiven etc.
Establishing a Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery at Washington State University
By Lindsey du Toit and Michael Derie, Washington State University
Why Set up a Cavity Spot Nursery?
Cavity spot occurs in almost all regions of carrot production. This disease is listed by the California Fresh Carrot Advisory Board (CFCAB) as one of the primary concerns for carrot growers in California, who produce 70 percent of the fresh market carrots in the U.S. The pathogens associated most commonly with cavity spot are Pythium violae and P. sulcatum, but other species of Pythium can cause this disease.
These are not true fungi, but water molds (oomycetes). These pathogens survive in soils where they produce two kinds of spores: long-lived, sexual spores called oospores, and short-lived, swimming spores called zoospores. The oospores are triggered to germinate by chemicals that roots of plants exude into the soil. The pathogens are most active and usually cause the most damage in cool, moist soil conditions.
Cavity spot seldom causes a reduction in overall carrot root yield (weight or size of roots). However, the disease can have a very significant economic impact for growers because the shallow, sunken lesions caused by the pathogens on the surface of roots make the roots unmarketable for fresh or processing markets (Fig. 1). The lesions on roots start as very small (a few millimeters in diameter), sunken areas that can increase to more than 1 inch in length.
Figure 1. These severe symptoms of cavity spot on carrot roots are caused by Pythium sulcatum. Photo courtesy Alex Batson, WSU graduate student
Pythium species usually infect carrot roots within four to six weeks after planting, but infection can continue as long as roots remain in the soil. Cavity spot usually increases the longer carrot roots are left in the soil. The disease will even continue to develop on roots that have been harvested and placed in storage. The lesions or cavities on the roots can be invaded by secondary microorganisms, including bacteria. This can cause the cavities to become discolored, particularly during heating/blanching of carrots being processed (Fig. 2).
Figure 2. Lesions and discoloration of peeled and blanched carrot roots result from cavity spot.
Growers often struggle to manage cavity spot using cultural practices and fungicides. Recommendations to control cavity spot include avoiding fields with a history of the disease, using a crop rotation of at least three to four years between carrot crops, not using high rates of nitrogen fertilization, planting in fields with good drainage that is less favorable for the swimming spore stage, not planting in cold soils and harvesting roots in a timely manner to limit development of cavity spot. Some fungicides can be highly effective against cavity spot, such as metalaxyl or mefenoxam (e.g. Ridomil). Unfortunately, the pathogens that cause cavity spot are notorious for developing resistance to fungicides like mefenoxam, which severely limits the ability for growers to control cavity spot using fungicides.
Given the difficulty of managing cavity spot, many seed companies are trying to breed for resistance to the disease, but the process is not easy and progress has been slow. There are differences in susceptibility to cavity spot among commercial cultivars, but there are no cultivars that are completely resistant to the disease. Carrot growers in some states continue to fund Phil Simon, USDA-ARS carrot breeder based in Madison, Wisconsin, to develop cultivars with better resistance to cavity spot. Simon has been collaborating with Mary Ruth McDonald, plant pathologist at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada, in efforts to breed for resistance to cavity spot. McDonald has established a cavity spot nursery in a muck soil in Ontario that is naturally infected with cavity spot pathogens.
In most regions of carrot production in the U.S., the soils are sandy/mineral, so growers in California have been wanting to create a cavity spot nursery in a field with mineral soil. In 2019, the CFCAB provided funding to Lindsey du Toit’s program at Washington State University (WSU) to establish a cavity spot nursery at the WSU Mount Vernon Northwestern Washington Research & Extension Center (NWREC) in Mount Vernon, Washington, to complement the muck cavity spot nursery in Ontario and provide further support for Simon’s efforts at breeding for resistance to this disease.
How to Establish a Cavity Spot Nursery
To establish the cavity spot pathogens in the field site in Mount Vernon, a 1-acre field was fumigated with metam sodium in fall 2018 to kill microorganisms in the soil that might compete with cavity spot pathogens. The field was then inoculated with P. violae and P. sulcatum three weeks later. The inoculum was produced by growing the pathogens on vermiculite moistened with V8 juice (Yes, Pythium species like V8 juice as much as some people like Bloody Marys!) in mushroom bags. About 250 gallons of inoculum were spread over the field using a tractor mounted, PTO-driven, Viton sling spreader (Fig. 3). The inoculum was incorporated into the soil by rototilling. The field was inoculated again with 266 gallons of inoculum of P. violae and P. sulcatum in April 2019.
Figure 3. Inoculum of Pythium sulcatum and Pythium violae was applied to a field at Washington State University using a spreader, and then incorporated by rototilling, in fall 2018, spring 2019 and fall 2019 to help establish the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery.
On May 3, 2019, 219 carrot breeding lines and 12 commercial carrot cultivars were planted in replicate blocks in the field. The cultivar Atomic Red, which is highly susceptible to cavity spot, was planted throughout the trial as a susceptible check to assess the uniformity in cavity spot pressure across the field. Each plot was a single row, 10 feet long. Rows were spaced 20 inches. The seed for each plot was planted using a Wintersteiger cone push planter set to distribute 100 seeds in each plot. The trial was irrigated 19 times between May and early September to promote carrot root growth and development of cavity spot.
In September 2019, each plot was rated for the percentage of plants that had bolted (started flowering) and for average height of the plants. In October 2019, the roots in each plot were undercut, dug manually, washed and rated for the percentage of roots in each plot with symptoms of cavity spot and the severity of symptoms on each root based on the size of the largest lesion on each root (Fig. 4, Fig. 5).
Figure 4. Researchers undercut, dig and wash carrot roots in the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery in 2019 to evaluate replicated plots of 231 Plant Introductions, breeding lines and cultivars for resistance to cavity spot.
Figure 5. A variation in size of cavity spot lesions was observed on the roots of Atomic Red, Plant Introduction 451752 and Envy in the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery in 2019.
Success at Establishing the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery
Cavity spot symptoms were observed on all but eight of the 231 carrot lines evaluated, including all 12 named cultivars. Isolations from root lesions confirmed the symptoms were cavity spot, as Pythium was isolated from all of the lesions tested. There was a wide range in incidence and severity of cavity spot among the 231 lines, which demonstrated success at establishing the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery. For the 231 carrot entries evaluated, the percentage of roots with cavity spot ranged from 0 to 100 (average of 33.6 percent), and the severity ranged from 0 to 79 (average of 19.8) (Table 1).
Although cavity spot symptoms were observed on the vast majority of the carrot lines evaluated, for the eight entries with no cavity spot, 50 to 100 percent of the plants had bolted. When plants bolt, the roots turn “woody” and do not show symptoms of cavity spot, as demonstrated by the negative correlation between the percentage of plants bolted and both the incidence and severity of cavity spot. Therefore, the eight lines with a high percentage of bolting and no cavity spot were not included in the data analysis for cavity spot.
Of the 12 carrot cultivars evaluated, the incidence and severity of cavity spot was least on Purple Haze. Based on trials in Ontario and other sites, Purple Haze is partially resistant to cavity spot. In the WSU Cavity Spot Nursery, 11.1 percent of Purple Haze roots had cavity spot lesions, with a mean severity of 3.2 (Table 1). In contrast, the percentage of roots with cavity spot was greatest on Atomic Red, the susceptible control cultivar (42.4 percent of roots had cavity spot, with an average severity of 28.5). Of the other breeding lines and plant introductions (PIs), 26 had fewer roots with cavity spot than Purple Haze, and 13 had less severe cavity spot symptoms than Purple Haze, the partially resistant cultivar. Some of these 13 lines had a lot of bolted plants, which confounded cavity spot ratings, but five of the 13 had no bolted plants. This included PI 225869 (0.3 severity of cavity spot), PI 225870 (1), PI 652188 (2), PI 451761 (2) and 725-1 (2.5). These lines might be valuable sources of resistance to cavity spot. The entries will be evaluated again in 2020 in the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery to determine the consistency in response of the cultivars. The percentage of roots with cavity spot was significantly correlated with the severity of cavity spot across all the lines tested (r = 0.9154 at P< 0.0001).
The percentage of plants that bolted ranged from 0 to 100 (average of 15.9 percent) and was particularly severe for some PIs. None of the named cultivars had bolted plants, except for Purple Haze, which only had 2.5 percent bolted plants. Carrot rust fly pressure was also quite severe in the trial.
What’s Next?
After rating the carrot roots in October, the roots were spread out on the field and disked into the soil to increase cavity spot pressure for planting another trial in 2020. In addition, a third batch of inoculum of P. sulcatum and P. violae was produced on vermiculite with V8 juice, applied to the field in October 2019 and incorporated into the soil. The field will be inoculated again in spring 2020 to continue building cavity spot disease pressure for this nursery. This nursery will support the development of carrot cultivars with improved resistance to cavity spot.
The 2020 WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery trial will be included in the field tour as part of the 40th International Carrot Conference on Oct. 5-6, 2020, at the WSU Mount Vernon NWREC. For more details on that conference, visit www.internationalcarrots.org.
Carrot seed was planted in the WSU Carrot Cavity Spot Nursery using a Wintersteiger cone push planter.
FAM recently unveiled its new V-belt slicing machine, the Volantis. The machine is suited for the transverse slicing of a large range of vegetables in slices, shreds and square pieces. It is designed for precise cutting of elongated and oblong products such as potatoes and carrots.
The machine can be fed manually or by a feeding system. The wide infeed channel will align long, slender products toward the slicing wheel. The more than 2-meters-long infeed section contributes to a better orientation of the product and will align it to prevent it from tumbling while it is fed into the slicing wheel, according to the company.
The combination of the high speed of the knives and the unique cutting method is designed to produce uniform slices with a smooth surface while minimizing breakage and ragged ends, thus increasing the shelf-life of products.
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