COOL questions and clarifications

From www.regulations.gov, we have a letter from Wild Rocket Food that addresses industry questions about COOL. Even with the USDA rulemaking, there will be no quick end to the questions about COOL.

August 20, 2008

Ag Marketing Service

USDA

Dear sir / madam

Re: COOL Questions

Wild Rocket Foods is a processor of juice, salsa, prepared fruit, prepared vegetables, prepared salad products, single/mixed packs of fruit and vegetables. We directly supply retail and receive product from both Brokers and Growers directly.

Please provide clarification to the following questions in relation to the COOL Interim Rule:

1. If we receive product of more than one country on a pallet (e.g. 300 bell peppers from Mexico, USA, Canada), should the Bill of Lading be split to demonstrate the exact quantity from each country, or can the total be quoted with three countries listed?
2. We have a customer requirement to quote STATE in addition to USA. Is it possible to abbreviate STATE when more than one needs to be listed e.g. WA, CA, AZ etc? This is important given the available space that we have on our packaging. We could perhaps put the abbreviated STATE into brackets after USA? “USA (CA, AZ)”
3. Is there a period of time, whereby a packer would be exempt from stating the country? Such as, if during a season changeover, the product is packed for less than 30 days from that particular country.
4. In the area of leafy greens, what products would constitute single vs. co-mingled commodities. For example, would arugula mixed with green leaf be classed as single or co-mingled? Also red leaf and green leaf mixed – both are leaf products? Also red leaf and red oak leaf?
5. Is there a defined list of covered commodities. For example at the COOL Compliance Meeting we were told Grapes were not included?
6. During a season changeover, a single commodity (packed as a single unit e.g. Squash) may come from two countries at the same time. Can we put the two countries on the label if our inventory stock shows we had both countries available at the same time? How accurate are we expected to be? Does the country need to be affirmatively identified during this time?
7. In the situation of point 6. how should the countries be separated? We were advised at the Compliance Meeting that a ‘comma’ is treated as an ‘and’, but this would be physically impossible for a single unit to come from two countries and will be confusing to the consumer. Could they perhaps be separated by a space or a ‘slash’?
8. Could the countries permitted for abbreviation be extended? We suggest New Zealand, Guatemala, South Africa, Argentina, Australia be considered.
9. We have a process of ‘steaming’ as a microbiological kill step in the preparation of some fruit products. It does not physically change the character of the product, though we later cut the product. Does this meet the ‘processed’ exclusion? For example pineapple in whole form, steamed, then cut into pineapple chunks as a single finished product.

We thank you for your consideration of these points.

Yours sincerely

Clare Rapa-Marley

Supply Chain Technical Manager