Every year, more than eight million tons of plastic waste escapes into the world’s oceans, the equivalent of setting five garbage bags full of trash on every foot of coastline around the globe. What if there was a platform to stop ocean plastic and at the same time help alleviate poverty through a global recycling ecosystem?

That is the ambitious goal of Plastic Bank and its founder David Katz, who will offer a keynote presentation at OPS 2022, Empowering the World to Stop Ocean Plastic.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has imposed sanctions on five produce businesses for failing to meet contractual obligations to the sellers of produce they purchased and failing to pay reparation awards issued under the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act. These sanctions include suspending the businesses’ PACA licenses and barring the principal operators of the businesses from engaging in PACA-licensed business or other activities without approval from USDA.

The following businesses and individuals are currently restricted from operating in the produce industry:

The number of flavor combinations when it comes to cooking pasta recipes seems endless but this stuffed shell pasta bake may soon become a staple in your weekday line-up. 

Flavor 1st Growers & Packers grows and packs more than 30 different varieties of produce, all of which are tracked from field-to-fork using state-of-the-art distribution programs, labeling and procedures.

As Flavor 1st enters the second quarter of 2022, its planning plantings, local programs for summer deals and getting ground ready on its summer farms as it looks forward to a successful summer after a promising 2021.

DNO Produce, a leading fresh-cut produce processor and wholesale produce distributor, broke ground on an expansion to its fresh-cut produce facility. The expansion will increase DNO’s production capacity by 33 percent through additional space, improved layout and process improvements.

Tops Friendly Markets, a leading full-service grocery retailer in New York, northern Pennsylvania and Vermont, promoted Jeff Cady to the role of vice president of produce and floral as part of Shared Services Center.

Shared Services Center supports both Tops Friendly Markets and Price Chopper/Market 32, which formally merged this past fall.