Reader’s Digest June 2020

• A review of 25 years of tomato harvests in Portugal shows a solid growth, driven by profound changes, such as the creation of Producers' Organizations and an increasingly reduced number of operators.
• Tomato paste exports increased by 2% in Azerbaijan for the first 2 months of 2020, although the overall exports of fruit and vegetable have fallen by more than 20%.
• In South-Central Italy, price negotiations are still ongoing and growers are threatening to go to the free market.
• The Princes Group (PIA) published a video statement on its commitment to responsible sourcing and fair price.
• Schoeller Allibert presents the new standard Foldable IBC, the Combo Excelsior.
• The European Comission published its report on front-of-pack nutrition labeling. For the UK, the transition period (wrt Brexit) lasts until the 31^st December 2020, and the longer-term consequences of Brexit are not yet defined.
• Turkish tomato paste producers have seen a significant increase in orders from Asia and Europe for Q1, 65% higher than Q1 last year.
• Copa and Cogeca, Celcaa and FoodDrinkEurope are currently on the fourth round of negotiations and are expressing concerns on the lack of progress on the UK-EU trade deal.
• ANICAV is setting up a division dedicated to products made from organically grown tomatoes, to support the significant growth of this sector.
• The 14^th World Tomato Processing Congress and the 16^th ISHS Symposium on the Processing Tomato, originally scheduled in March 2020, are now postponed to 6-10 March 2022.
• Nestlé is selling its North American past business Buitoni, and PepsiCo is investing in Spain in the gazpacho brand Alvalle.
• WPTC Crop Update as of 12 June 2020.
• Paste Prices: USA, Spain, Portugal, Italy, China, Chile, as of 15 June 2020.
• Global Trade of Tomato Paste updated 15  June 2020.
• Portugal ranked 5^th in the world for paste exports in 2019, which was a year of adjustment for foreign trade.
• A new report examines the impacts of the pandemic on California's agriculture. There has been no significant disruption in establishing the crop this season. The economic impacts will depend on how producers and processors will respond to changes in demand.
• In Italy, a budget of 47 million Euros has been granted to the "PomoIn" development contact, in order to boost the production of canned tomatoes and to install new lines for the production of pulses.
• U.S. processed tomato stocks as of June 1, 2020.
• A recent study carried out in India evaluates the efficacy of non-chemical methods for management of the root-knot nematode.
• Indian researchers reported that Atmospheric Cold Plasma (ACP) processing technology improved the quality of tomato-based beverages during storage.
• Syngenta Group Co. Tld. Launched Syngenta Group, a new entity based in Switzerland, uniting the strengths of Syngenta AG (Switzerland), ADAM (Israel) and Sinochem (China).
• Infographics on the top 20 producing countries between 1994 and 2019.
• No price agreement has been reached yet in Southern Italy.
• Comment on U.S. processed tomato stocks as of June 1, 2020.
• The 20^th edition of Cibus, the International Food Exhibition, has been rescheduled in May 2021. Cibus Forum will take place in September at the Parma exhibition centre. This will be a physical event as well as a live streaming event.
• The Italian Ministry of Agricultural Policies, Food and Forestry has been asked to step in and set up mediation on the topic of price agreement in Southern Italy.

You can find the individual articles in the NEWS list and/or search by keyword, date etc.