New York produce importers woke up Saturday morning to delayed shipments and logistical headaches after the winter’s worst blizzard collided with the East Coast Friday afternoon. “It was a logistical nightmare without a doubt,” says Claire Sakho of Global Bloom, a fresh fruit and vegetable importer based out of the Bronx that specializes in European and Israeli produce. “The one good thing is, it was on a weekend.”
Air shipments delayed
For Sakho, the most immediate issue was produce the company had scheduled to fly in on Saturday and Sunday. With the majority of flights delayed or canceled, Global Bloom was forced to locate and co-ordinate their shipments, with conditions largely out of the company’s control. “Any kind of delay is bad for you,” says Sakho.
Sakho notes that issues caused by delays have a way of compounding. To illustrate, she mentions one of Global Bloom’s delayed shipments, which arrived more than 15 degrees warmer than it was supposed to be kept. “You don’t know what’s being done by the airport. You don’t know what’s being done by the airline employees.” Sakho adds that air shipments were further delayed by a much longer than typical wait for USDA inspections.
4-6 wait for inspection at terminal
Sakho says that even once air shipment issues were resolved on Saturday, weather had caused a massive backlog at the Hunt’s Point Terminal Market, which was unable to open until noon. “The waiting time was between 4-6 hours to get into the market,” says Sakho. According to Sakho, some drivers – unable to reach the inspection point, or unwilling to wait – turned around to come back the next morning, causing further delays.
Sakho adds that, while ploughs have cleared most roads, her company is still seeing delays on land shipments. She notes, also, that some trucks have been snowed in by ploughs and have yet to be excavated from the snow.
Port delays expected to last 1-2 weeks
According to Sakho, bigger delays are likely to come. “Now, of course, the port is going to be a different issue,” she notes. “That’s usually the worst. Any delay of the seaport generally trickles.”
With ships delayed from reaching the harbor by Friday’s weather, Sakho says that the port should expect a large backlog of shipments – one that will likely take several days to resolve. Sakho expects it will be one to two weeks before the port is “back on track.”
Storm missed Mid-Atlantic crops
Fortunately, many growers in the Mid-Atlantic region saw the storm miss their crops, which are mostly out of season.
“We got about 20 inches of snow in our fields in Virginia; others got more snow and some got less,” said Jimmy Carter of Parker Farms. “But as far as our operations in the state, there have been no effects so far.”
Parker Farms grows broccoli, sweet corn, squash, cucumbers bell peppers and eggplant in Virginia, but all of that is done in the summer. Their production is currently centered in Florida, and though those crops were out of the way, the sale of those could yet be affected by the storm.
