North Bay Business Journal

SEBASTOPOL — Ninety-year-old apple processor Manzana Products Co. Inc. has merged with a large France-based agricultural products co-operative, giving the European company an entry point to U.S. markets for its apple products and Manzana backing for growing sales.

SANTA ROSA — As the supply of raw materials for wine are evaporates around the globe, emerging economies become thirstier for the beverage, the U.S. emerges as the world’s top wine market and the complexities of international trade, investment and economics multiply, 13 top California wine industry executives will be defining the challenges and opportunities at the Business Journal’s 2012 Wine Industry Conference on April 18 in Santa Rosa.

Wine consumption is growing worldwide and particularly in the world’s new largest wine market, the U.S. Trouble is, shocks to the global economy and to the wine business in particular over the past several years along with tough growing seasons have dramatically limited the supply of grapes and wine sold in bulk to supply the thirst.

The Business Journal asked members of the 2012 Wine Industry Conference panel on grape and wine supply panel at the about some of the hotly discussed topics in the wine business in California.

After nearly 10 years of oversupply and low prices, California winegrapes and bulk wines are suddenly in a position of scarcity. Wineries are scurrying to find grapes and secure vineyard assets, while négociant wineries see their wine sources dwindling. How did we come to be in this situation, and what lies ahead for growers, wineries and consumers?

NORTH BAY — Employers in Sonoma County are more confident about the prospect of hiring in the second quarter compared to last year, with 13 percent saying they expected to increase staffing levels, according to a quarterly survey by ManpowerGroup, an international staffing firm with a Santa Rosa location. And overall in the North Bay, employers are generally more confident about the economy than they have been, suggesting that a slow but steady economic recovery is wending its way through region, employment experts said.

NORTH BAY — With the federal health overhaul hanging in the balance of what will most certainly be a politically charged U.S. Supreme Court decision, insurance brokers in the North Bay offered a familiar refrain to employers on what changes, if any, they should make to their health plans: wait and see and stay the course.

Feb. 3, 2012: Themed, A Night in Venice, Legal Aid held their annual ‘Lawyers with Heart’ event for their child abuse prevention program at the Mary Agatha Furth Center in Windsor / Mar. 1, 2012: Becoming Independent held their annual meeting in Santa Rosa

One of the little known facts about cartoonist Charles Schulz was that he was a big supporter of women’s athletics and athletes.

“I have a vision, Chuck,” Peppermint Patty said in a 1979 Peanuts strip. “I can see a day coming when women will have the same opportunities in sports as men!”

Sonoma County’s Department of Health and Human Services has partnered with the Alexander Valley Health Center in Cloverdale to bring “essential mental health and substance abuse treatment services” to Northern Sonoma County through its Path2Health program, but its future is now somewhat clouded with the prospect of health care reform being struck down by the Supreme Court.