Split decision - better, worse and about the same

The industry is divided on their feelings about the state of the fresh produce business in six months. This week's Fresh Talk poll asks if readers anticipate conditions to be better, worse or about the same as current conditions. The voting, with about a day plus left in the voting, is as follows:
Better 27%
Worse: 33%
About the same: 39%

So far the optimists are hanging in there. I'm also interested in the reader verdicts about the impact of the recession on industry travel.

Here are some headlines snatched from the Web today:

Safeway wants health care reform from Obama administration Everyone should be covered

USDA to get $250M to upgrade computers At least Dell will be happy

Vilsack confirmed as Agriculture Secretary Reauthorization of child nutrition and WIC programs will highlight 2009 work

Campbell's creates mypyramid app Five bowls of soup a day?

Depression survivor's advice She is serious about saving:

Each week she buys a three-pound bag of fresh carrots. "I don't buy baby carrots. They're too expensive." She slices the carrots in strips and stores them in a jar with water in the fridge. She buys a head of cabbage each week. "It makes wonderful cole slaws or sautéed cabbage. We don't have to have expensive lettuce."

Super Bowl brings demand for a variety of foods Can't lose this visual picture

This year, the commission estimates more than 46 million pounds of avocados will be consumed that day. If all that fruit was turned into guacamole and piled onto the football field at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, where the game will be played, it would cover the field from end zone to end zone at a depth of nearly 18 feet

Wall Street shares plunge on inauguration day State Streets leads financial institutions lower... ugliest inauguration day ever.. Roubini speaks of systemic banking crisis


Veggie grower makes delivery for inauguration organic grower from Penn. makes big deliveries to DC

Taste trends of 2009
Simplicity, health and comfort top three taste trends

No future for iceberg lettuce

Packer Managing Editor Fred Wilkinson here.

Of all fruits and vegetables, iceberg lettuce has to be one of the most maligned (unfairly in my opinion), scorned for being a low-rent salad base that lacks nutritional value.

The latest charge in the case against iceberg: It's socially and environmentally irresponsible.

A piece in Advertising Age quotes futurist (how does one become a futurist anyway?) Richard Watson as saying that energy and water demands of producing hydroponic iceberg lettuce place it on the list of "socially unacceptable foods."

The charge seems a tad overblown if for no other reason than hydroponic lettuce production is small compared to conventional field production.

And while I'm very skeptical of such predictions in general, it does raise an interesting issue.

Considering environmental pressures in growing regions (water in California comes to mind) and rising costs for fertilizer and other inputs, it's not inconceivable that activists and regulators in the near future could could call for "smart" planting and harvesting the same way they now champion lower environmental impact "smart" growth.

BASF eco efficiency analysis and other top news for Jan. 20

Luis of the Fresh Produce Industry Discussion Group uncovers another gem this morning, a report about the BASF eco-efficiency analysis. From the post, the description of what this eco-efficiency analysis is all about:

Is it ecologically responsible to buy an apple from overseas? Shouldn’t people as a rule choose fruit from national or local producers? Such questions play an every greater role in consumers’ buying decisions. Yet our gut feelings can be misleading. Approaches, such as BASF’s eco-efficiency analysis, make it possible to carry out an objective assessment.

TK: There may be more than one way to carry out an "objective assessment" but this BASF method show that environmental assumptions don't always sync with reality. Check out the post on the FPIDG for the full tale of the tape.

Other headlines snatched from the Web today

Apple crop shrinks a little Washington's record crop drops from 112.7 to 111.8 million boxes. Small fruit diverted to processing and trend may continue.

Betting on bananas at the inauguration A Swedish company has a betting line on what words President Obama will say at inaguration; "bananas" is 1,000 to 1.

EU pesticide legislation approved USDA FAS report on EU developments

Crude oil falls below $35 as recession deepens Stockpiles grow but OPEC cuts could hike prices in second half of 2009

Europe takes two steps backward in food safety Coverage from Kenya on Europe's new approach to pesticide regulation

Initial assessments of earlier versions of this legislation concluded that up to 85 per cent of chemicals under review could be banned. The Swedish Government now estimates that 23 chemicals will be de-listed. But uncertainty prevails, as no rigorous, EU-wide assessment of the legislation has been undertaken.

Even a conservative implementation of the new rules would increase the prevalence of food-borne pests and cause the food supply to decrease.

A British environmental consultancy estimates it would cause a drop in overall EU food production of at least 25 per cent, raising food prices and putting an enormous burden on low-income Europeans.

More pesticides banned; farmers fear food crisis More European coverage of pesticide issue

Obesity and the addiction to food The theme: foodaholics anon

Can we believe in change at USDA? Chuck Hassebrook touted by Grist for high level USDA job

Salinas leaders frustrated over violence

With charity for all - the start of the Obama presidency

With the weight of the world on his shoulders and the best hopes of America with him, Barack Obama will take the oath of office at exactly noon today. From a BBC report: America's first black president will place his hand on a Bible used by Abraham Lincoln at his inauguration in 1861 and repeat the oath of office, promising to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States". He will then deliver his inaugural address - a 20-minute speech which, aides say, will focus on dual themes of responsibility and accountability. Crowds in the National Mall will watch proceedings on huge video screens. At least two million people are expected, a record number for an inauguration event. TK: If President Obama draws comparisons to Lincoln today for the themes in his address, that will be well noted. Better still if the same sentiment and affection can be true in four years. The magnitude of President Obama's new responsibilities as the leader of the free world and the gravity of our economic peril will test his leadership and character. Here is the text of President Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address of March 4, 1865 Fellow-Countrymen: At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.	1
On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, urgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war—seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.	2
One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."	3
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.