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Aug 8, 2024 | 
producebluebook.com | Doug Nelson |Cliff Sieloff |Greg Johnson
Reefer carriers and freight brokers that provide service to the produce industry at some point hear about this mysterious thing called “the PACA,” which seems to set the rules and police the industry. How wonderful that such a thing exists!But chances are, if someone is taking the time to educate you about PACA, it’s not good news.
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Jul 25, 2024 | 
producebluebook.com | Cliff Sieloff |Doug Nelson |Pamela Riemenschneider
The Problem: Wrongful rejection to the carrier. The Key Point: Actively and responsibly work with all parties to place the product and mitigate losses. The Solution: Gather information, communicate in writing, and act in good faith. Q: We are a carrier based in Texas. This morning, we arrived in Dallas with a load of berries out of San Antonio. The receiver performed an in-house inspection and then refused the shipment, marking “rejected to truck,” on the bills.
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Jul 5, 2024 | 
producebluebook.com | Doug Nelson |Cliff Sieloff |Pamela Riemenschneider
Claims against carriers for damage to fresh produce present multiple challenges. The first question is often whether responsibility for the damage at destination rests with the carrier or the shipper. We’ve written several articles on this in the last few years, including “Warm When Loaded—Maybe” (September/October 2023) or “Case Study: Carrier vs. Shipper” (January/February 2023).
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May 28, 2024 | 
producebluebook.com | Cliff Sieloff |Richard Smoley |Pamela Riemenschneider
The Problem: Parties cannot agree on responsibility for trouble load at destination. The Key Point: Mitigate damages now; assess responsibility later. The Solution: “Handle for the account of whomever it may concern.”Q: We are a freight broker located in Texas. We occasionally run into situations where a receiver will reject a shipment due to late arrival or allegations that the carrier failed to maintain proper temperatures.
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May 15, 2024 | 
producebluebook.com | Cliff Sieloff |Karen Raugust |Greg Johnson
The ProblemSolo driver used after team agreed to. The Key PointProving damages resulting from late arrival can be difficult or impossible. The SolutionA liquidated damages provision can be used to help compensate for losses. Q: I handle transportation for a produce shipper located in Florida. We’ve been paying premiums to truck brokers for team deliveries to California and Arizona.
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Dec 15, 2023 | 
producebluebook.com | Richard Smoley |Cliff Sieloff |Greg Johnson
The Yuma Valley, near the border between Arizona and California, and the Imperial Valley, in the southernmost part of the state, are also key producers of fruits and vegetables. They too get water from a government project: the immense Colorado River Storage Project, which extends from Flaming Gorge Dam in northern Utah, near the Wyoming border, to the river’s mouth in the Gulf of California. Like its California counterparts, the Colorado Project is an immense achievement of engineering.
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Dec 14, 2023 | 
producebluebook.com | Richard Smoley |Cliff Sieloff |Karen Raugust |Greg Johnson
Outsiders sometimes think that California’s Salinas Valley—which touts itself, with some justice, as the nation’s salad bowl—is part of the Central Valley, but that’s not the case. They are two different valleys, separated by the California Coast Range. The center of the Salinas Valley, near the central coast of the state, is the Salinas River.
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Dec 13, 2023 | 
producebluebook.com | Richard Smoley |Cliff Sieloff |Karen Raugust |Greg Johnson
After the water projects that divert rainfall and snowpack, the second major source of agricultural water in the West comes from underground. “In recent decades, reductions in surface water—a result of drier conditions and changes in environmental regulations—have prompted more groundwater use,” notes the Public Policy Institute of California Water Policy Center website—along with groundwater depletion. Growers have not been blind to water limits.
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Dec 12, 2023 | 
producebluebook.com | Richard Smoley |Cliff Sieloff |Karen Raugust |Greg Johnson
The agriculture sector in California and Arizona relies on two principal sources for its water supply. The first is gigantic state and federal projects, such as the State Water Project, the Central Valley Project, and the Colorado River Storage Project, which transfer water from wetter areas (much of it in the form of melted snowpack) to irrigated farmland in Central Valley; the Yuma Valley, which forms the border between California and Arizona; and the Imperial Valley in California’s far south.
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Dec 11, 2023 | 
producebluebook.com | Richard Smoley |Cliff Sieloff |Karen Raugust |Greg Johnson
It sounds familiar: California agriculture praying for rain after two decades of drought, then getting more—much, much more—than it asked for. When did this happen before? Starting in December 1861, when a storm of biblical length (43 days) rained down continually on the state. The next month in the state’s capital, Sacramento, Governor-elect Leland Stanford (later founder of the university bearing his name) had to travel to his inaugural ceremony in a rowboat.
