USApple acts as industry advocate in Washington DC

WASHINGTON DC — Where there is information, there is misinformation, and one of the jobs of USApple is to combat misinformation that’s out there. Jim Bair, president and chief executive officer, cited the case of an applesauce recall over concerns about elevated levels of lead.

“It was a cinnamon-flavored applesauce; the lead was coming from the cinnamon,” Bair said. “In fact, the applesauce was imported, as was the cinnamon. It wasn’t even a U.S. product. But consumers, all they hear is ‘applesauce is bad.’ So we try to provide information that's calming and reassuring,” Bair said.

USApple is supported by growers, packers, processors and other groups in the apple industry to advocate for industry interests at the federal level, as well as working to provide accurate information about apples and apple production.

Bair said the organization also works with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to ensure it, too, is working with accurate information and can react accordingly. Its USDA contacts came in handy about a decade ago, when a food-borne illness was traced to an orchard in California.

“Part of what we try to do is maintain contact with all the regulators in DC, so that when problems do arise – as they inevitably will, from time to time – that we can have those direct conversations,” Bair said.

The grower produced two specific varieties of apples, and the first reaction of the Food and Drug Administration was to advise consumers to avoid those two varieties, no matter where they were grown. Bair said USApple argued vehemently against that.

“’Why would you want to penalize growers who have no involvement in this recall whatsoever, who have grown a perfectly healthy product? Why would you want to impact those growers, and why would you want to confuse consumers?’ Fortunately, they changed the recall notice,” Bair said. “If they had (issued) that, we’d still probably be impacted by that, 10 years later.”

Bair said USApple works to get the industry’s message across to the federal government, a task that requires patience – sometimes a lot of patience. Bair said labor is one of those subjects.

Tree fruit growers nationwide use a lot of temporary labor that comes from out of the country through the H2A visa program. Growers believe it’s in need of reform, he said, but it’s been a long process with no answer yet.

“That’s a daily conversation here in DC. We’ve been at this for 20 years, and it’s still not fixed,” Bair said.

USApple has members throughout the United States, growing fruit for different kinds of markets.

“When I visit New England growers, (for) most of them there isn’t really much commercial fresh market,” Bair said. “They realized that even in Boston, New York (and) Philadelphia, Washington state apples are going to dominate those markets. So almost all of them have gone into pick-your-own, and they’re selling (other commodities). And honestly, I think they’re doing better economically than they ever were growing wholesale apples and trying to compete.”

This story has been updated since publication to clarify a quote from Jim Bair, president and chief executive officer of USApple.