The next Fresh Produce Consortium convention is moving back to London next year, and takes place on February 28 at the Royal Lancaster Hotel near Hyde Park. The event has been held at Belton Woods near Grantham for the last two years.

This year the convention is being held in conjunction with the National Farmers Union, lasting one instead of two days, and followed by the grower of the year dinner. The awards event was previously scheduled alongside the HortEx exhibition, which is not taking place this year.

The convention was on the agenda at the FPC council meeting, held during the first day of the National Fruit Show on October 17.

The council was updated on a number of crucial matters affecting the trade, including: The FPC has issued a code of practice for vehicles covering best practice advice for hauliers to prevent the entrance of illegal immigrants; the FPC is consulting with members on establishing maximum residue levels for critical crop/chemical combinations, after the European Commission released 28 million euros (approx. £17.6m) in funding for the programme; Chep has reached a 'satisfactory solution for importers' in its new pallet pricing arrangements; and the FPC's financial situation for the nine months ending September 30 is described as healthy, with bank balances 'in line with expectations.' The FPC has also involved itself in the creation of an international federation for the codification of produce, and an agreement has been reached to go ahead with this. The first job of the federation will be to develop Price Look Up codes, the reduced space symbology barcode RSS14, traceability. The industry will be keeping the four figure product ID codes, while EAN/UCC would be denote integrity of packer numbers, traceability codes and barcodes. Jeanine Sabino of Monoprix has been nominated as the first chairperson of the new body.

The FPC is still taking bookings for its wholesale weekend conference, which takes place on November 3-4. Those interested should contact Carol Workman on 01733 237117