SIC 2033 Canned Fruits, Vegetables, Preserves, Jams, and Jellies

Encyclopedia of American Industries | 2005 | Copyright

SIC 2033
CANNED FRUITS, VEGETABLES, PRESERVES, JAMS, AND JELLIES

This industry includes establishments primarily engaged in canning fruits, vegetables, and fruit and vegetable juices; and in manufacturing ketchup and similar tomato sauces, or natural and imitation preserves, jams, and jellies. Establishments primarily engaged in canning seafood are classified in SIC 2091: Canned and Cured Fish and Seafoods; and those manufacturing canned specialties, such as baby foods and soups, except seafood, are classified in SIC 2032: Canned Specialties.

NAICS Code(s)

311421 (Fruit and Vegetable Canning)

Industry Snapshot

The canned foods industry generated more than $14.5 billion in sales in the late 1990s. The total value of shipments grew from $15.8 billion in 1997 to $17.7 billion in 2000. Canned food processors were the primary market for many of the nation's farmers. By contracting and paying in advance for a large part of the harvest, the industry guaranteed farmers and growers a cash income, helping to absorb the risks of marketing produce on the fresh market.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, tomatoes, sweet corn, snap beans, and green peas were the four most-processed vegetables in the industry. Domestic demand for processed tomato products grew throughout the 1990s, while consumption of canned green peas declined. Production costs of canned goods consisted of payments to farmers, container and label costs, labor, and fuel for transportation. Insurance, rental payments, and machinery costs also contributed to production costs.

Background and Development

Napoleon has been credited with saying, "An army marches on its stomach." Whether he did or not, he knew the importance of supplying his troops with adequate, wholesome food during a successful military campaign. When the governing French Directorate offered a prize in 1795 to the citizen who found a way to keep food fresh during campaigns, Napoleon supported the project. Fourteen years later, in 1810, Emperor Napoleon would award the prize to Nicholas Appert, an obscure French confectioner and chef, whose accomplishment secured his place in history.

Appert theorized that when food is heated in a container with no air in it, the food would keep. He cooked foods in cork-stoppered bottles in boiling water, perfecting his methods. Proof of his success came when Appert's preserved fruits and vegetables were sent around the world on sailing ships and remained edible. Two months after Appert published his procedures, an English merchant, Peter Durand, applied to King George III for a patent for a "Method of Preserving Animal Food, Vegetable Food, or Other Perishable Articles a Long Time from Perishing or Becoming Useless." Durand's use of tin canisters in his process revolutionized food packaging and launched the canning industry as we know it. Captain Edward Perry took tinned foods on his Arctic expeditions in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Tinned pea soup and beef left behind by his party were recovered and eaten in 1911, and tins of veal and carrots from Perry's 1824 expedition were found to have been safely preserved when they were opened more than 100 years later, in 1939.

Around 1822, tinned foods came to the United States, and the first American patent for tin containers was granted three years later. By...

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