7:30am – 8:30am ~ Registration
8:30am – 8:40 ~ Welcome Remarks from Rodrigo Cifuentes, EVP & COO, Pace International
8:40am – 9:10 ~ Jessa Allen, CAE, USApple, VP of Membership & Events USApple: The Voice of the America’s Favorite Fruit
9:10 am – 9:40 ~ Dr. Carolina Torres, Associate Professor and Endowed Chair in Tree Fruit Postharvest Systems, Washington State University Storage Technologies for Organic Apples
9:40am – 10:10 ~ Scott Christie, Pace International, Sr. Global Applications & Engineering Services Manager, Keeping Pace With Postharvest Technology and Innovation
10:10 – 11:00 ~ Brunch
11:00am – 11:30 ~ Trevor Suslow, T&K Suslow Consulting, LLC, Emerging Pillars of Produce Safety Optimization
11:30am – 12:00pm ~ Christian Aguilar Ph.D., Pace International, Senior Biology Scientist – Plant Pathology, Pace, Postharvest fungicide resistance management: using blue mold (Penicillium expansum) of pome fruit as a case study
12:00pm – Closing remarks
Jessa connects growers, suppliers, and vendors across the industry to increase collaboration, innovation, and profits. Her responsibilities include development of sponsors and allied supporters, marketing, maintaining member information, and management of USApple’s two annual conferences. Her diverse experience with professional and trade associations spans the healthcare, human resource and affordable housing industries.
Christian leads Pace’s pathology lab. She is an integral part of Pace’s Product Development Group and is a key contributor to new product development and product improvement. Her passion centers on tree fruit pathology. She recently was a Postdoctoral Associate at the Virginia Tech, Tidewater Agriculture Research and Extension Center in Suffolk, Virginia.
Dr. Carolina Torres, Associate Professor and Endowed Chair in Tree Fruit Postharvest Systems at Washington State University-Wenatchee TFREC. Experience in postharvest research focused on apples and pears, addressing issues such as how the environment affects fruit quality before and after harvest, physiological disorder’s development and assessment and development of new technologies. More than 20 years of experience doing research, teaching, leading research groups, and working with the fruit industry.
Scott oversees Pace’s global engineering services, developing innovative technology solutions, supporting customer’s high-quality standards, and meeting the changing needs of the industry. His responsibilities include overseeing ecoFOG applications and working with Pace’s account managers to ensure packing line equipment is functioning as efficiently and safely as possible. Scott has a degree in Mechanical Engineering and has experience in postharvest fruit packaging, storage and automation technologies, tree fruit production, postharvest quality control, and field agriculture.
Trevor Suslow, Ph.D. has fully transitioned from his position as VP of Produce Safety at the Produce Marketing Association and retains Emeritus faculty appointment at the University of California, Davis, Department of Plant Sciences. His past and current applied research combines lab and on-farm research on E. coli, Salmonella, and Listeria in conventional and organic production systems, for the purpose of identifying opportunities for optimal microbial reductions and delivery of safe food to the consumer.
North America
South America