Stakeholders still have an opportunity to provide feedback on the proposed changes to the walnut marketing order. The proposed amendments to the Federal Marketing Order are based on the record of a public hearing held earlier in the year. Executive Director and CEO for the California Walnut Board and California Walnut Commission, Robert Verloop said there are five key areas addressed in the proposed rule.
“The grades and standards as they are set right now are on outbound product. In other words, what the handler ships that is inspected and certified. Those standards are outdated relative to what the marketplace wants today,” said Verloop. “So, we’re removing that part of it but we’re still retaining the ability to set grades and standards and we will be looking at that.
The process to update the walnut marketing order initially began back in 2020. One of the other changes in the proposal includes moving the assessment being applied to incoming inventory to the handler. The assessment rate will also be updated as a result of working on strictly inshell products. “The new assessment rate starting out will be $0.0125 per pound, whereas in the past it was $0.025 of finished product. So, it essentially comes back to the same number because one is inshell and the other is finished product,” Verloop explained.
Overall, the changes are meant to modernize the marketing order to better reflect current industry conditions. Verloop noted two administrative functions that are addressed in the proposed rule. One expands the definition of “to handle” to include “receive.” Another is to remove a volume control authority that had never been exercised in the history of the order.
“A lot of the industry has just progressed so much over the last 40 years where the current specs and expectations and the requirements that customers have far exceed what is in our marketing order,” Verloop explained.
Industry members have until November 25 to submit feedback through the Federal Register.
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