In mid-April, with 200 loads of onions per day leaving the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, truck rates were skyrocketing and shortages were apparent. "Call me back later," Melinda Goodman of Four Seasons Trading Co. in Donna, TX, said Friday afternoon, April 15. I'm looking for trucks and I just cant find any. Two hours later, she said, Maybe you can e-mail me some questions and I can think about them over the weekend as I just have no time to talk right now. Trucks are really tight. Rates that were $3,200 are being quoted at $4,200 to $4,800. And there is no end in sight. Mike Martin of Rio

If a Vidalia onion is certified sweet, does that detract from the "Vidalia" brand of onion, which already implies sweet onions? A Georgia Superior Court judge on April 19 answered that question: No. National Onion Labs Inc. in Collins, GA, was the immediate winner in the legal case. But David Burrell, president of the company, insists that American consumers are the real winners. Mr. Burrell said that his business has faced legal confrontations since he opened a company named Vidalia Labs in 1998. After a lawsuit was filed against that company, he started Vidalia Labs International in 1999.

WASHINGTON - When the Dietary Guidelines boosted the daily recommended allowance of fruits and vegetables to five-to-13 servings per day from five-to-nine servings, the produce industry eagerly awaited the design of the new graphic that would guide consumers in making smart dietary choices. On April 19, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released its long-awaited redesigned food pyramid to mixed reviews from members of the produce industry. "MyPyramid is about the ability of Americans to personalize their approach when choosing a healthier lifestyle that balances nutrition and exercise,"

Two academics who recently published a paper that concluded that retail slotting fees were an efficient way to introduce new products have seen their study blasted by many in the grocery industry. The report, Are Slotting Allowances Efficiency-Enhancing or Anti-Competitive?, was written by K. Sudhir, a professor at the Yale School of Management, and Vithala R. Rao, a professor at Cornell Universitys School of Management. Using data from one northeastern chain and dating back to the mid-1980s, the researchers concluded that slotting allowances serve to efficiently allocate scarce retail shelf

REEDLEY, CA - "Just as of today, we have an agreement with D.J. Forry to do the sales for us," Mark Nakata of California Tree Ripe in Fresno, CA, told The Produce News on Tuesday, April 19. "We feel like we have a good synergy with these folks, he said. "We feel that they are people of high integrity, and we have every confidence we will be able to grow our program with them on a very positive basis. California Tree Ripe is a certified organic packer and shipper that expects to have approximately 165,000 boxes of tree fruit this season. The Produce News met with Mr. Nakata and Forry salesman

As April gets long in the tooth, the relatively seamless transition between onion production from Mexico and south Texas is just about complete, as producers from the Lone Star State anticipate a better second half of the season. During the week of April 18, onion crossings from Mexico were all but complete as virtually all Texas onion shippers were in full production. Shipments from Texas began in late March, but as is typically the case, promotable volume didn't hit the marketplace until mid-April. Most Texas shippers will remain in production through May and into June. Acreage is up this