“...we have all the packing list in front of us, actually in the computer and with a projector, and we review different factors, and we make the decision of loading or not loading fruit that is carrying some -- fruit that can be not absolutely normal. We analyse that and for me the authorisation of loading pallets of more than ten days is every Wednesday in that meeting, that is a regular meeting, which is not in the manual, where the commercial area allows to load the pallets who needs to make a special decision.”
“....this area I know very well, the pallets stay a small period of time, while it is located into a container, and it has absolutely nothing wrong, and these fruit represent what normally is done in Chile, a hundred million boxes in Chile are loaded this way, a hundred million boxes are loaded exactly the same way, and there is not any injury or damage reported by having, let's say, ten minutes or whatever amount of time the fruit there, you know. Actually, I would like to add that Chile loads more than 90 per cent of the fruit and grapes in open vessels, yes, in conventional vessels, and the system is that you carry the fruit in a truck, not in a container to the port, you open the truck, you take the pallet, and you move the pallet into the vessel, it's exactly probably two or three more times than this operation, yes, and it's something absolutely normal that has been done all the years and all the fruit suffered the same procedure.”
“One of my tasks is to ascertain whether the grape is suitable for storage under the marketing arrangements and strategy that we as a company have. So I would look at containers and you would see a slight dulling, the berries would have lost their lustre, a little bit of their lustre and the stems may be slightly dehydrated, going a sort of khaki colour and the bunches may have slumped in the box. It is very difficult to explain, but they may only have dropped a quarter of an inch or so, but they looked a little bit slightly older and as -- I would then -- if I saw anything like that, I would explain to Michelle and Sebastian, who were the QC people employed by Santa Elena in Europe, that I thought there would be -- there may be an issue with that container.”
“Q. They gave the appearance of grapes that had been a long time off the vine, would that be fair? A. No, they gave the appearance of grapes that – in previous seasons, grapes that we had cut and harvested earlier and had been stored in Chile and then shipped later had arrived looking very good. If you put a good grape in and it is kept the right temperature, kept correctly, then you should expect a good grape out. What a cold store isn't is a hospital and when you put the good grape in the container, in my view, if it is kept at under 1 degree, about anywhere between 31 and 33 -- which is old money -- but they are, I believe, the best temperatures for transporting grapes, then when it comes out the other end it will still have a good life. If that suffers some form of distress and abuse on that journey, however it is caused, then when it comes out the shelf life is reduced and that is in my view what we saw with that year.”
“not for supermarket!!”
“The thing is, once the pallet came out of the cold store, which was running at between 31 and 33 degrees, all of a sudden you get that change of air and you give it plenty of oxygen, and it is just going to go "whoopee", right? The thing is if we supply to someone like a multiple, they have a best before of three days or even four days at that time of the year, plus the fact they also, sort of an unwritten rule in their things, is that you are going to give the customer a couple of days, because it is not like a punnet, where you buy your punnet and it has "display until the 22nd, best before the 25th". This is a bag of grapes. You give it to the supermarket, they then have three days to sell it. Within that three days that grape has deteriorated. If we had supplied that to one of our customers who had then supplied it on to the multiple, it had gone into the multiple and it had died on the shelf within the three days, they would have received the most almighty rollicking. The fruit would have been recalled from the shelf and there would have been a huge fight levelled at someone.”
“Evidence of Mr Russel Parkin”
“the grapes…being attacked by moulds and rot to various degrees and the general quality/condition of the grapes was varying considerably from one box to a neighbouring box in one end and the same pallet…. Due to above noted very uneven and to a large extent poor condition of the examined grapes the said grapes had lost a considerable part of its expected remaining storage/shelf life hence to mitigate the loss as much as possible it was deemed necessary by Everfresh to have all the shipments marketed as soon as possible. In order to successfully do that the price would have to be considerably reduced.”
“Examination of a significant number of cartons, disclosed the condition of the grapes to be moderate and overall weak and dangerous. With both varieties [Sugarone and Flame] the condition of the claimed pallets was fairly similar, viz inspections revealed that fruit was reasonable in quality but weakened by the consistent presence of decay, consistency, shatter, stem necrosis etc.”
“Q. Yes, did you discern any difference within containers as to pallets that had been close to the refrigeration machinery, for example, as opposed to those which had been near the doors? Did you notice any difference in the condition that you saw? A. In some of the containers, yes. Q. In some, but not all? A. Not all, no. Q. In some there was a uniform – A. Degradation. Q. Degradation, as you saw it. I suppose you don't remember -- no, of course you don't remember which ones -- A. No.”
“If the overall cargo temperature was reflected by the customer loggers, then we would expect to detect patterns of deteriorated cargo more prevalent towards the doors. This was not the case despite the temperature variation caused by the loading plan. A more likely explanation is inherent vice and consequent weakness in the grape.”
“Off power must be kept at a minimum as temperature fluctuations can have an impact on the product quality. Therefore when reefers are handled at terminal (or on board a vessel) it is of the utmost importance that reefers are plugged in immediately and disconnected as late as possible before being handled. This can only be achieved by close communication between the vessel and the terminal... Please find below the maximum allowable off power time for various reefer cargoes: Cold Treatment, Controlled Atmosphere, Super Freezer, Chilled meat and special shipments off power periods should not exceed 1 hour. Chilled cargo: Less than 3 hours. Frozen cargo: Less than 8 hours.”