Produce Industry Suppliers: Expect Climate Change, Sustainability Issues To Carry Into New Year

By Thomas Skernivitz|December 21, 2022

World issues are always closer to home than you think. Some suppliers to the vegetable growing industry are taking a global perspective when asked what developments they foresee for the New Year. AquaSpy is one of them.

Bruce Moeller, CEO of the irrigation technology company, is keeping his eye on three bullet points, each specific to current world issues:

“How will climate change’s rapidity in accelerating feedback loops create threats, challenges, and opportunities for ag technology?”
“While trying to make a humane difference, what alternatives and backup plans should be adopted for growing and for logistics and distribution to alleviate world hunger, exacerbated by the Ukraine and Russian war?”
“If fuel, fertilizer, the excessively strong dollar, and higher interest rates, coupled with inflation, undermine the world’s ability to grow and operate within normal empirical boundaries, what can we do as ag tech to genuinely assist and ameliorate the deteriorating conditions and pressures inflicting pejorative conditions for growing in Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America?”

Linda Fritz, Owner of crate system manufacturer Sun Sugar Farms, says 2023 will bring an emphasis to replacing plastic clamshell packages in the produce aisle with more sustainable containers.

“The current attention to global warming issues, the impossibility of actually recycling those clamshells, and the overall dissatisfaction with the large amount of packaging that is ending up in landfills, will contribute to this focus,” Fritz says.

Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation will be passed in key states, Fritz says, to ensure that grocery stores pay a penalty if they are not willing to compensate their suppliers for the additional cost of new biodegradable and truly recyclable packaging options.