EMPOWERING PRODUCERS OF FOOD & FIBER
Friday, April 23, 2021
Volume 94, Number 17
CapitalPress.com
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CULTIVATING BRIGHT IDEAS
From grape goggles to berry blockchains, NW Ag
Innovation Hub connects growers, technologists
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
S
ALEM — Bruce Sonnen came up with the
idea for “wine goggles” a few years ago as
a way to improve the quality of Oregon’s
already world-famous Pinot noir.
The concept is simple,
said Sonnen, the vineyards manager
at Van Duzer Vineyards in Dallas,
Ore. As Pinot noir grapes ripen, they
gradually change color from green to
purple to dark purple, a period in viti-
culture known as veraison.
But not all grapes ripen at the
same pace, and unripe fruit can throw
off the fl avor of the fi nished wine
(Sonnen compares the taste to Lem-
onhead candies). Color is the key to
helping workers identify which clus-
Bruce
ters to remove before the all-import-
Sonnen
ant harvest and crush begin.
To help identify ripe grapes, Son-
nen had an idea for tinted eyewear that can make
those darker shades of purple “pop” more clearly.
“The idea with the color goggles is they could
make those ripe berries stand out,” he said. “We can
Courtesy of Pete Nelson
Allison Malone, a student at University of Ar-
kansas at Pine Bluff , runs a TerreSentia robot to
monitor progress of cotton maturity. TerreSentia
is a product of Earthsense, an AgLaunch portfolio
company which has been fi eld testing in Tennes-
see and the Mississippi Delta region since 2019.
make sure nothing we don’t want goes into the wine.”
Sonnen pitched his idea to a team of developers
last year as part of a fi ve-day Agricultural Innovation
Design Sprint Challenge, hosted by the Technology
Association of Oregon.
The team designed a pair of glasses, which Sonnen
said has the potential to become a low-cost tool for
winegrape growers.
“You’d be able to sell them like hotcakes in our
industry, for sure,” he said, adding that “it’s still a
work in progress.”
Wine goggles are one example of how the newly
established Northwest Ag Innovation Hub is laying
the foundation for agricultural technology to fl our-
ish in the Willamette Valley, connecting farmers with
tech gurus to solve problems and create new busi-
nesses along the way.
Pipeline for startups
The Hub is led by Alex Paraskevas, rural innova-
tion catalyst for the Strategic Economic Development
Corp., or SEDCOR, based in Salem and serving Mar-
ion, Polk and Yamhill counties.
Since joining SEDCOR in 2018, Paraskevas
has become something of an evangelist for the
See Ideas, Page 9
Pandemic demand snarls shipping traffic
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
Transportation is critical to the
U.S. dairy industry to move milk from
farms to processing plants and then to
ship dairy products to domestic and
overseas markets.
But the pandemic has made all
modes of transportation — shipping,
trucking and rail — more diffi cult.
The U.S. economy has been speed-
ing up due to massive government
stimulus. Meanwhile, everything is
slowing down on the supply side,
Phil Plourd, president of Blimling and
Associates, said in the latest “Blimling
Breakdown” webinar.
Looking at overseas
transportation, ship-
ping slowdowns, port
delays, a shortage of
containers and labor
issues are all challeng-
Phil Plourd ing overseas trade, he
said.
On average, ships at the Port of Los
Angeles are taking eight or more days
to get unloaded, he said. That’s more
than twice as long as normal.
“So we have major logjams at the
ports,” he said.
The pandemic accelerated e-com-
merce, and it’s still going strong. A lot
of goods are coming from China and
elsewhere overseas, and freight rates
from Asia to the West Coast are high,
he said.
“This puts sort of a premium on get-
ting stuff here and getting it here as
quickly as possible. It’s become more
cost eff ective to send empty containers
out of the U.S.,” he said.
It’s more cost-eff ective to send ships
back to Asia with empty containers to
bring in another load of iPhones and
Pelotons (stationary bicycles) than to
wait to load dairy products or other
goods, he said.
See Shipping, Page 9
Don Jenkins/Capital Press File
Cargo containers at the Port of Tacoma in Washington
state. A shortage of containers and labor are slowing
shipments.
Organic produce sales continue growing, sales up 9.3%
By SIERRA DAWN McCLAIN
Capital Press
The pandemic has driven record
sales and interest in organic food
— and that momentum isn’t yet
slowing.
A new report from the Organic
Produce Network and Category
Partners this month shows that total
U.S. organic fresh produce sales for
the fi rst quarter of 2021 increased
9.3% from the same period in 2020
— nearly $88 million additional
sales.
Conventional produce dollars, in
contrast, saw only a modest year-
over-year increase at about 2.9%
during the fi rst quarter.
By volume sold, organic
bananas, carrots and apples ranked
as the top drivers at retail this fi rst
quarter, according to the report.
By dollar amount sold, the top
10 categories, from highest to low-
est, were:
• Pre-packaged salads.
• Berries.
• Apples.
• Herbs and spices.
• Carrots.
• Lettuce.
• Bananas.
• Citrus.
• Tomatoes.
• Potatoes.
Packaged salads, in the No.
1 spot, accounted for 17% of all
organic sales.
Sarah Brown, education and
advocacy director at Oregon Tilth,
a nonprofi t that certifi es organic
producers, told the Capital Press
last year that consumers turned to
organic produce during the pan-
demic for several reasons. People
were cooking more at home and
appeared to be looking for a sense
of security and a stable, local food
source.
See Organics, Page 9
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