Food

US President Donald Trump, during his tariff speech on Wednesday, claimed that egg prices have declined by 59%. Praising Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins, he said, “Secretary of Agriculture, great job you did on eggs. Now we have lots of eggs, and they’re much cheaper—down about 59% now—and they’re going down further.” He continued, “And then we got to work on eggs, and we got to work on everything. And our great Secretary of Agriculture, you did a fantastic job, Brooke Rollins. And as I said before, the price of eggs dropped now 59%, and they’re going down more. And the availability is fantastic.” “They were saying that for Easter, ‘Please don’t use eggs. Could you use plastic eggs?’ I said, ‘We don’t want to do that.’ And you really came through. It’s an amazing job. Thank you very much, Brooke. You did great,” he said. Have egg prices actually gone down? The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported in its weekly egg market report on April 2 that wholesale egg prices fell to $3.00 per dozen, marking a 9% decline from the previous week. “The supply situation at grocery outlets has greatly improved in recent weeks and consumers are once again seeing fully stocked shelves and enjoying a range of choices without purchase restrictions,” the report detailed. In February 2025, the average retail egg price was around $5.90 per dozen. The recent decline is largely attributed to a slowdown in avian flu cases and reduced demand due to previously high prices, allowing suppliers to rebuild their stock, CNN reported. “We’re back to low price eggs again. There seems to be plenty of supply,” Stew Leonard, Jr., owner of the Stew Leonard’s grocery store chains, told CNN. “I’ve talked to our farmers down in Pennsylvania that have a number of farms with egg laying hens. They’re repopulating their stock again. Production seems to be back up.” However, it may take a few weeks for wholesale price drops to reflect on most grocery store shelves, according to the USDA. “Only now starting to see shelf prices slowly decline,” the Department of Agriculture’s report said. “Demand from egg products manufacturers is mostly light as many have been able to take advantage of a sluggish carton market to build supplies on the spot market, enough to increase production levels to a 3-month high.” Source HT

McDonald’s has unveiled a series of exciting new dessert options across multiple regions, offering customers unique flavors and limited-time treats. Minecraft-Inspired Menu in the UK In the United Kingdom, McDonald’s has introduced a special Minecraft-themed menu, featuring several new items. Among them is the Apple and Shortcake McFlurry, a fruity twist on the classic McFlurry, available in mini and regular sizes. Additionally, the Cheesy Garlic Bread Dippers provide a savory option, offered in individual or shareable portions. To complement these, McDonald’s has launched the “Nether Flame” Hot Sauce as part of the Minecraft Movie Meal, which includes a choice of a Big Mac, nine Chicken McNuggets, or four veggie dippers, accompanied by a side, drink, and one of six collectible toys. A Minecraft-themed Happy Meal is also available for a limited time. Biscoff-Themed Desserts in Australia McDonald’s Australia has collaborated with Biscoff to bring four new dessert options to its menu. Customers can enjoy the Biscoff Coffee Frappe, a blended coffee drink infused with Biscoff flavors, or the Biscoff Shake, which combines creamy texture with Biscoff crumbs. The Biscoff McFlurry, featuring soft-serve ice cream with Biscoff pieces and caramel sauce, has received mixed reactions, with some fans wishing for an authentic Biscoff sauce instead. Rounding out the collection is the Biscoff McPop, another indulgent treat in this special lineup. Grandma McFlurry in the U.S. In the United States, McDonald’s has introduced the Grandma McFlurry, a nostalgic dessert designed to pay tribute to grandmothers everywhere. This new McFlurry features creamy vanilla soft serve blended with a special syrup and crunchy candy pieces, offering a comforting and indulgent flavor profile. The Grandma McFlurry is available for a limited time at participating locations. International McFlurry Innovations Beyond these country-specific offerings, McDonald’s continues to experiment with McFlurry flavors worldwide. Some notable regional McFlurry variations include the Magic McFlurry in France, the Kit Kat and Coconut McFlurry in Brazil, the Pirulin McFlurry in Aruba, the Cadbury Crème Egg McFlurry in Canada, and the Cotton Candy McFlurry in select markets. With these diverse dessert additions, McDonald’s remains committed to catering to different tastes and preferences across the globe, continually surprising customers with creative and innovative menu items.

This week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture canceled almost half of food shelf orders from Minnesota farmers under the federal Commodity Credit Corporation. The Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families has placed orders for 78 truckloads of food so far in 2025, including for eggs, milk, chicken and dried fruit. It was for distribution to its statewide network of food banks, shelves and meal programs.  However, according to an emailed statement from the department only 39 of these orders have been received so far. Five remaining pending orders have been purchased but not yet delivered.  In 2024, CCC accounted for about 30 percent of the food available from the Department of Children, Youth and Families, and distributed through the statewide network of food banks, food shelves and other food distribution programs.  The department’s statement says  this will significantly reduce the amount of food coming into its Minnesota programs between now and September. There hasn’t been word on any impact on the Emergency Food Assistance Program, or TEFAP, which accounts for about 70 percent of food available from the department and distributed through the statewide network.  The statement also says the department hasn’t heard from the USDA beyond the individual cancelled orders nor about potential future impacts to the food purchases. The Department of Children, Youth and Families has been receiving temporary discretionary food and funds through the CCC to support food banks and food distribution sites including food shelves. The current contract with food banks extends through December contingent on continued availability of CCC funds and food from the USDA.  Rachel Holmes, director of advocacy and community engagement at The Food Group, said the food system in Minnesota is strained. She added the food order cancellations by the USDA is “terrible timing” and that food shelves most likely will need to adjust their budgets for a 30 percent increase in food purchases. If they’re unable to do that, she said, they may need to make some “really tough decisions” by reducing operating hours or providing less food to households.  “Food banks will do everything in our power to be able to continue offering nutritious, culturally connected foods  for them,” Holmes said. “And we are facing some challenges, but we’re really in it together … it’s a really trying time and it’s really threatening to increase the number of food insecure Minnesotans and putting really massive pressure on our food system.”

Salesforce pledges to invest in Agentforce, customer success, and workforce development Salesforce launches more services on Hyperforce, allowing customers to securely deploy a deeply unified platform with Agentforce, Data Cloud and Customer 360 Applications, adhering to local data residency Singapore Airlines and Salesforce collaborate on AI-powered customer service applications Salesforce, the world’s #1 AI CRM*, announced plans to invest USD $1 billion in Singapore over the next five years, affirming a strong commitment to accelerate the nation’s digital transformation and Agentforce adoption. Singapore is an important growth market for Salesforce as businesses increasingly embrace Agentforce to unlock new opportunities. This investment underscores Salesforce’s support for Singapore’s National AI Strategy 2.0 and the nation’s vision as a driver of global AI innovation. Spurred by a USD $6 trillion digital labor market, thousands of customers around the world are investing in Agentforce, Salesforce’s digital labor platform, to build and deploy agents that can reason, decide, act, and drive meaningful outcomes 24/7. Singapore has been dealing with a slowing growth rate of the labor force, contributed by an aging population and declining birth rates. Agentforce delivers Singapore an opportunity to rapidly expand its labor force in many key service and public sector roles. This investment will help support Singapore enterprises as they build limitless digital workforces, bringing humans together with trusted autonomous Agentforce agents to unlock new levels of productivity, innovation, and growth. As Agentforce adoption accelerates, it has the potential to drive significant impact across Singapore’s industries, startups, and the public sector. Mr Jermaine Loy, Managing Director of the Singapore Economic Development Board said: “Singapore welcomes Salesforce’s investment, which will boost our ongoing efforts to build a vibrant hub for AI innovation and adoption across our economy. Salesforce’s initiatives in AI research and workforce development will strengthen our ecosystem by catalysing innovation for key industries and corporates based in Singapore.” “We are in an incredible new era of digital labor where every business will be transformed by autonomous agents that augment the work of humans, revolutionizing productivity and enabling every company to scale without limits,” said Marc Benioff, Chair and CEO, Salesforce. “Singapore is at the forefront of this shift, and as the world’s largest provider of digital labor through our Agentforce platform, Salesforce is thrilled to expand our work with the business community and our longtime partners in the region to drive innovation, productivity and growth.” Driving global Agentforce innovation from Singapore Salesforce has been investing in Singapore for nearly two decades and has established a thriving customer base and partner ecosystem in the region. Customers of all sizes, including industry leaders like Singapore Airlines, Grab, M1, FairPrice Group, Ocean Network Express and PRISM+ are using Salesforce AI technologies to drive efficiency, enhance customer experiences, and unlock new revenue streams. Singapore plays a crucial role in driving Agentforce innovation for Salesforce. In 2019, Salesforce expanded its AI Research team internationally, choosing Singapore as its first overseas AI Research hub location. Since then, the hub has significantly contributed to the global development of AI for the industry. This includes development of industry leading models such as multimodal language-vision foundation models (BLIP), and time-series foundation models (Moirai). The AI Research hub has contributed to product innovations such as AIOps Agents that help Salesforce achieve highest levels of site availability and in-house code LLMs for helping customers optimize their code for performance. Their work has resulted in over 100 research papers and patents being published. This continued investment will not only drive Agentforce innovation through the research hub but also support Salesforce’s expanding customer base in the region. In fact, Singapore Airlines and Salesforce announced that the Airline is incorporating Agentforce, Einstein in Service Cloud, and Data Cloud into its customer case management system, enabling it to deliver more consistent and personalized service to its customers. The two companies also plan to co-develop AI solutions for airlines at the Salesforce AI Research hub in Singapore, aiming to provide greater value and additional benefits to the industry. Bringing local data residency for Agentforce to Singapore Salesforce is expanding its services on Hyperforce, Salesforce’s trusted next-generation platform architecture, in Singapore to provide data residency for Data Cloud, Agentforce, and Unified Marketing Applications (UMA) by next month. This will empower Singapore businesses to capitalize on Salesforce’s Agentforce and data offerings while adhering to local data residency regulations, an imperative for regional and global organisations in regulated industries such as the government, financial services or telecommunications. This helps align with data privacy regulations, enhancing data security and fostering trust among customers and stakeholders by demonstrating a commitment to compliance. Salesforce first introduced Hyperforce in Singapore in 2021. Building an Agentforce-ready workforce Salesforce is refreshing its Singapore office with a new space to enable customers to transform their workforce with digital labour. The space will include Agentforce activations space and a demo pod to provide hands-on experience building and deploying trusted, autonomous AI agents through Agentforce. The new space will also be used for upskilling initiatives for the ecosystem of partners and the community. Salesforce remains committed to investing in workforce development by upskilling in Agentforce, ensuring the workforce is equipped for the jobs of the future. The company is partnering with Institutes of Higher Learning such as Singapore Management University, Institute of Technical Education, and Ngee Ann Polytechnic to equip students with in-demand CRM and AI skills through training and certifications, as well as connection to opportunities for employment in the Salesforce ecosystem. Leveraging Trailhead, Salesforce’s free training platform, these initiatives equip individuals with the skills essential for thriving careers in the digital economy. Salesforce commitment to giving back An important part of Salesforce’s culture is the belief that business is the greatest platform for change, reflected in the company’s 1-1-1 model of corporate philanthropy, which dedicates 1% of the company’s equity, 1% of its employees’ time and 1% of its products to giving back. Over the last two decades, Salesforce Singapore and its employees have spent over 190,000 hours volunteering in their communities and giving over … Read more

As enterprises embrace agentic AI to drive automation and decision-making, the rapid proliferation of AI agents presents new challenges for security, compliance, and interoperability. According to Gartner®, “By 2028, 33% of enterprise software applications will include agentic AI, up from less than 1% in 2024, enabling 15% of day-to-day work decisions to be made autonomously.”1 However, without a centralized management solution for all AI agents, organizations risk fragmented AI ecosystems, operational inefficiencies, and regulatory exposure. Boomi’s new AI Studio, now available in early access, provides organizations a secure, compliant, and vendor-agnostic way to design, orchestrate, monitor, and optimize unique AI agents — whether built on Boomi or third-party technologies — and provides full AI agent lifecycle management to ensure seamless integration, governance, and control across the enterprise. “With Boomi AI Studio, we’re giving organizations a powerful yet accessible way to build, monitor, and orchestrate AI agents with trust, security, and governance at the core,” said Ed Macosky, Chief Product and Technology Officer at Boomi. “As of today, Boomi has deployed more than 25,000 AI Agents for customers. This strong market adoption of our AI agents highlights not only the real value they’re delivering, but also the need for a solution that enables organizations to leverage AI responsibly while accelerating innovation and achieving transformative outcomes.” “As AI reshapes our business landscape, effective management of these systems becomes essential. Boomi AI Studio delivers precisely what enterprises need to harness AI at scale — comprehensive governance, seamless orchestration, and a robust framework for integrating AI across operations,” said Amit Sinha, President & Co-Founder of WorkSpan. “With Boomi’s solution, we can confidently deploy and oversee AI agents throughout our ecosystem, ensuring compliance and fueling innovation while maintaining operational excellence.” Boomi AI Studio offers a fully integrated environment for AI agent design, governance, and orchestration, including: “Boomi is addressing a critical gap in the market, setting a standard for managing AI agents at scale. While many vendors focus on releasing new agents, few are tackling the essential challenge of managing, deploying, curating, and optimizing these environments effectively,” said Shawn Rogers, CEO of BARC US. “The rise of agentic AI presents significant opportunities for automation and efficiency, but organizations require a structured approach to ensure these agents operate securely, ethically, and efficiently. To truly harness the power of AI-driven automation, enterprises need a comprehensive solution that provides the necessary oversight and guardrails to scale with confidence.” Boomi is now accepting applications for early access to Boomi AI Studio. A limited number of organizations will be selected to participate in this phase. Early adopters will gain hands-on access to existing features while helping shape future enhancements. General availability will follow in Q2 2025, based on feedback and iteration. For more information on Boomi AI Studio and to apply for access, please visit the Boomi AI Studio Website. Boomi AI Studio features, functionality, and availability are subject to change based on ongoing development and user feedback. This announcement does not constitute a commitment to deliver specific future capabilities or general availability timelines. Boomi makes no guarantees regarding performance, regulatory compliance, or continued availability of specific feature