by Kevin Payne | Jan 29, 2019 | Digital Transformation
Digital transformation – the application of digital technologies to fundamentally impact all aspects of business and society – has been underway for years. Now, more recently, the wave of digital innovation has come to the fresh food supply chain and post-harvest technology. Growers, shippers, processors, logistics providers and grocers are looking to new software and hardware solutions to drive change that fundamentally improves their business and the products that they offer to their customers. Digital transformation for the...Continue Reading...
by Kevin Payne | Jan 22, 2019 | Sustainability
Fresh food sustainability is a far more complex subject that most of us would think. Last week I attended the Trust in Food Symposium which featured viewpoints on fresh food sustainability and food chain integrity from farmers, restaurateurs, food processors and a wealth of NGOs. (In fact, I had no idea there were so many NGOs involved in various aspects of food sustainability.) A representative of the International Food Information Council Foundation presented their recently published 2018 Food and Health Survey. Their research...Continue Reading...
by Kevin Payne | Jan 15, 2019 | Freshness Management
Here’s a food spoilage true story. Over the recent holiday break, I went to my local grocery store (who shall remain nameless) on a Wednesday and purchased a clam shell of name brand strawberries. As usual, they looked fine when I bought them. The next morning, less than 24 hours later, I took them out of my refrigerator and they looked like what you see in the photo above. Mushy. Fuzzy. Inedible. That morning, I took them back to the store and they offered to exchange them. I went to the produce department and looked for another...Continue Reading...
by Kevin Payne | Jan 8, 2019 | Freshness Management
Shelf-life variability of produce is a significant problem but one that many in the industry are unaware. It’s easy to assume that all pallets harvested from the same field on the same day will have the same amount of freshness or shelf-life. Unfortunately, that’s simply not true. There’s a lot of variability. A LOT. What are the five top causes of shelf-life variability of produce? Why do some fruits and vegetables spoil before we expect them to? What can we do to manage shelf-life and reduce the variability and premature spoilage...Continue Reading...
by Kevin Payne | Jan 2, 2019 | Freshness Management
What are key Fresh Food Industry Trends for 2019? Based on the current trajectory, what can we predict for the year ahead? If we thought the last two years in the fresh food industry were tumultuous, they may pale in comparison to 2019. Certainly, the last couple of months have been chaotic in terms of the stock market and various public policy initiatives and has led to talks of a recession, despite many healthy economic indicators. What does this mean for fresh food industry trends in 2019? Here are three trends or predictions...Continue Reading...