Our meat and poultry plants are experiencing varying levels of production impact, due to the planned implementation of additional worker safety precautions and worker absenteeism. For example, out of an abundance of caution, we have suspended operations at our Columbus Junction, Iowa, pork plant this week due to more than two dozen cases of COVID-19 involving team members at the facility. In an effort to minimize the impact on our overall production, we’re diverting the livestock supply originally scheduled for delivery to Columbus Junction to some of our other pork plants in the region.

We remain open with full functionality from quoting and sales of new systems, replacement parts, production and delivery of products and essential services to our customers. At present, our administrative, inside sales, marketing and engineering functions are being performed by ASGCO team members on a rotating working remotely schedule with full and complete access to all of the same resources they have when working out of our corporate. Additionally, every team member is reachable at their standard phone number and email address.

The T. Marzetti Company has two priorities: First, to provide for the health, safety, and welfare of our team members and by extension their loved ones. Second, to ensure that we continue to play our part in the vital food supply chain. 

With so much misinformation out there about food and packaging, we appreciated FDA Deputy Commissioner Frank Yiannis for making personal comments to the media Thursday, and the new public service announcement posted by FDA. Frank repeats the fact that there's no evidence COVID-19 spreads via food, nor is food packaging associated with transmission. Be sure to get this information and video to all of your teams and associates.

US Foods has secured approximately 20 retail distribution partnerships across national grocery store chains, and is selling much-needed product to retailers across the country as they strive to maintain inventory given unprecedented consumer demand during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Sysco Corporation will kick off a month-long social media campaign, Take Out To Give Back, in conjunction with No Kid Hungry in order to provide healthy and nutritious meals in underserved communities while promoting the restaurant industry during the COVID-19 global pandemic.  

Vortex slide gates, diverters, iris valves and loading spouts are used around the world every day in the production of many vital items, including food, medicine, cleaning agents, medical equipment, toilet paper, tissues, petroleum, batteries and etc. We are currently operating at full capacity at all of our worldwide locations and will continue to do so as long as this guidance remains in place or we are instructed to cease activities by Federal, State, and/or local authorities.

At this moment, all TC Transcontinental Packaging facilities are contributing responsibly to the global effort to halt the pandemic, protect the health of the employees and their families, and ensure the safe continuity of the activities in the countries, provinces and states it operates. TC Transcontinental’s values of respect, teamwork, performance and innovation are at the hearth of everything it does, and decisions taken.

This week on our From the Cold Corner podcast, I interviewed Lowell Randel, VP of government and legal affairs at the Global Cold Chain Alliance (GCCA) for the very latest developments regarding COVID-19's impact on the cold food supply chain.

The impacts of COVID-19 on the fresh produce industry are fast-moving. Unfortunately, this virus is spreading quickly around the entire globe. A regional issue has become a global one quite quickly, and most countries across the globe are responding with closed borders, complete lockdowns, and transportation limitations. With so much uncertainty at the pinnacle of this pandemic, we are bound to see impacts on our food system, and both supply and demand of fresh produce.