Fruits, Vegetables & Specialty Crops

Fruit, vegetable and specialty crop marketing orders and agreements help producers and handlers work together to solve marketing problems that they cannot solve individually by (1) maintaining the high quality of produce that is on the market; (2) standardizing packages and containers; (3) regulating the flow of product to market; (4) establishing reserve programs for storable commodities; and (5) authorizing production research, marketing research and development, and advertising.

Marketing orders may include any of the following tools for use by a fruit, vegetable, and specialty crop industry:

Promotion and Advertising.  Authorizes generic promotion of the agricultural commodity to build demand in domestic and /or export markets.

Research and Development.  Permits the industry to conduct production and marketing research and development projects to reduce costs, improve yields, streamline product distribution, and boost trade and consumer demand.

Quality Regulation.  Imposes mandatory minimum standards on product shipped to prevent inferior quality product from depressing the market for the whole crop, assure customer satisfaction, and drive increasing consumer repurchase.

Pack and Container Requirements.  Requires standardized marking or labeling, size, capacity, weight, dimensions, and pack of product, helping ensure product integrity and quality in the channels of trade.

Marketing Information.  Allows collection and sharing of industry data to equip individual producers and handlers to make the best possible production and marketing decisions.

Quantity Regulation.  Controls the amount of product placed in commercial channels during periods of exceedingly high or low volume to stabilize markets for industry and consumers.

Import Regulation.  Imposes comparable quality regulations on authorized imported commodities to assure a consistently high quality product moving into the marketplace.