Six years ago, Jim Provost, president of I Love Produce LLC. saw a notice on a bulletin board at his daughter’s high school — Special Olympics Basketball was looking for volunteers. “I used to coach, and I was looking for ways to give back to my community, so I called up the head coach and that was it,” he said.

Since then, Provost’s team has made a name for itself. “We won the gold the last time the Pennsylvania Special Olympics held a state-wide competition,” he said, “and because we won the gold we became eligible for the national games.”

This year’s Special Olympics national games will

On March 31, Kevin Donovan is retiring from Phillips Mushroom Farms after spending the past 35 years as the sole salesman involved in selling the company’s entire production each day.

He told The Produce News that it has been a great ride and lived up to the expectations of the career he hoped for growing up in southeast Pennsylvania in the 1950s and 60s. Donovan, who was born in 1949, lived in urban Philadelphia and watched the many businessmen and laborers shuffle off to work in the early morning each day and come home late at night. “I decided in high school, I didn’t want to live in the

Cathy Burns, currently co-CEO of the new International Fresh Produce Association formed by the combination of United Fresh Produce Association and the Produce Marketing Association, will become its singular CEO effective March 31. Tom Stenzel, currently co-CEO and past president of United Fresh, will move into a consulting role, working closely with Burns through June 2022.

“When I first joined PMA, I spent time with Tom exploring opportunities for our then-respective associations to collaborate and bring greater value and voice to our industry. I saw his passion about the potential our

Ingles Markets Inc. announced the promotion of Patricia (Pat) E. Jackson to chief financial officer. Jackson will replace Ronald B. Freeman, who recently retired as CFO after successfully serving Ingles for nearly 17 years.

Jackson has been the company's controller since she joined Ingles in 2010. Prior to that, she was the CFO of Sisters of Mercy Services Corp. Jackson is a licensed CPA and holds a master’s degree in accounting. The company said it has valued her contributions at Ingles and is pleased to continue to benefit from her finance background and leadership expertise.

“We are proud

Moxxy Marketing promoted Allie Coombs to project manager. Coombs, who first started with Moxxy in 2014, has been part of the agency’s growth through two Salinas, CA, brick and mortar (literally) offices, to its current position as a virtual-operating nationwide powerhouse in food, beverage and ag marketing.

"Allie came to Moxxy with fresh produce sales experience, which gives her valuable perspective on our industry, and over the years she has developed into a knowledgeable fresh produce marketer," said Karen Nardozza, president and CEO. "She is the quintessential Moxxer. She is driven to

Equitable Food Initiative, the workforce development and certification organization that partners with growers, farmworkers, retailers and consumer advocacy groups, recently published findings of an eight-month survey highlighting the challenges Mexican farmworkers face when they are recruited and deployed to work.

As part of the study, more than 1,300 interviews were conducted with 650 guest farmworkers who were recruited for work on fresh produce farms farms in the United States, Canada and Mexico. The results highlighted concerns around transparency in contracts, physical safety, isolation