An affiliate of Mexican grower Triple H plans to open a new warehouse in McAllen, Texas next month to help bolster its supplies of produce items like tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and mangoes to the U.S. market.

During the Produce Marketing Association's (PMA) Fresh Summit event in Anaheim over the weekend, SmartCold's Jesus Claudio Zazueta told www.freshfruitportal.com the 20,000-square-foot in/out facility had been six months in construction.

"The cold storage facility that is part of the Triple H group with an in/out service, and complies with all the rules that the FSMA (Food Safety Modernization Act) requires," he said.

"We have six different rooms where we’ll be able to store different products with different temperatures; we separate them as each product needs different temperatures, and with the ethylene filters we also control the compatibility of each product.

"We have a system which is being developed especially for the warehouse to have the inventory online, so all the people working there can check availability in real time from where they are."

Zazueta added the site had an additional expansion area which could be utilized in the medium term.

Photo: Triple H

www.freshfruitportal.com