July 20, 2020

Mission Produce, Hazel Technologies Announce Program that Extends Avocado Shelf Life

Mission Produce, today in partnership with Hazel Technologies, announced the launch of AvoLast by Hazel, a shelf-life extension program that keeps avocados at an optimal level of ripeness for three extra days on average.

The AvoLast program uses a quarter-sized biodegradable and food-safe Hazel packaging insert that temporarily blocks an avocado’s ethylene receptors and slows the ripening process. With more shelf-life, the consumer reaps the benefits of a longer timeframe to enjoy an avocado with ideal freshness, quality and taste. What’s more, by increasing the shelf-life of both hard and ripe Hass avocados, retailers can reduce throwaways, in turn increasing profit while creating more positive consumer experiences that drive category growth.

“As consumer trips to the grocery store decrease, AvoLast is the perfect solution to support avocados on the shelf. With AvoLast, retailers can continue or enhance their avocado ripening programs without compromising customer experience due to overripe fruit,” said Mission Produce’s Sr. Director of Business Development Patrick Cortes. “After testing the solution in various environments throughout our supply chain, the AvoLast program extended the shelf-life of ripe fruit by an average of three days. Partnering with Hazel Technologies on this application demonstrates one of many ways Mission continues to invest in innovation and provide value to our customers.”

Alongside its consumer benefits, AvoLast will significantly reduce global food waste, a profound environmental, ethical and financial threat. In the United States alone, about 30 percent of all food that is harvested is thrown away, often because of early spoilage. Furthermore, growing produce requires a great deal of resources including water and energy. This means that every time a piece of food is thrown away, these resources go to waste.

“According to the US Department of Agriculture, over 80 billion pounds of food is thrown away each year in the US—an absolutely staggering and tragic figure,” said Hazel Technologies CEO, Aidan Mouat. “Our AvoLast partnership with Mission allows us to deliver a longer lasting product that reduces waste not just in terms of the actual food, but also in the water used to grow that food and the fuel used to ship it. The impact ripples back through the supply chain.”

AvoLast uses technology exclusively developed by Hazel Technologies, a USDA-funded agricultural technology company aimed at reducing food waste and increasing the efficiency of produce supply chains. The two companies first announced a partnership in 2019 after a successful pilot phase. Expanding that partnership across Mission’s global supply chain was made easy due to Hazel’s drop-in solution which minimizes any operational impact.

The technology behind AvoLast was recently recognized by Fast Company magazine as one of its “World Changing Ideas” for 2020 and its positive benefits have been studied and tested by many of the country’s top agricultural research programs including UC Davis, Cornell University and Oregon State University.

 

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