At its annual meeting in Salinas, CA, March 6, Navidad Medical Foundation honored Watsonville, CA-based Driscoll Strawberry Associates and the company’s chairman and chief executive officer, J. Miles Reiter, with its annual Hero Award in recognition of donations from Driscoll’s totaling $107,700 to support Natividad’s cross-cultural initiatives.

Paul Kawamura, son of Orange County Produce LLC’s managing partner, Matt Kawamura, is now on the sales desk at Orange County Produce. He is the fourth-generation Kawamura in the family business.

“He has actually been working for the company for three or four years,” said Matt Kawamura in an interview with The Produce News March 5. “He was learning about the accounting side and a bunch of other things initially. Now we brought him over into the strawberry sales.”

Ready Pac Foods Inc. promoted Tristan Simpson to vice president of corporate communications. In this newly created position, Simpson joins the Ready Pac executive leadership team and will lead the company’s communications efforts.

Apple industry leaders from across the country will soon converge in Washington, DC, and when they do they’ll be greeted by materials bearing a whole new look.The U.S. Apple Association will officially launch its new brand identity next week during its bi-annual board meeting in Washington, DC.

Paul Kneeland of Kings Food Markets inspected produce with RLB's Joey Granata and Howard Fisher, and Kings' Paul Hamilton, Jonathan Horowitz and John Spellman.The Philadelphia Wholesale Produce M

Art Salazar recently joined Commerce, CA-based Unified Grocers.

In his new position as manager of the produce department for the Southern California region, Salazar is responsible for managing the purchasing and sales team, as well as overlooking merchandising and store deliveries to maximize quality and reduce the cost of doing business.