USDA has risen its Florida orange forecast by 100,000 boxes compared to it February forecast, but it still remains 35% below last year’s final production numbers.
USDA now predicts that this season’s totals will reach 11.6 million boxes, the majority of which are made up by Valencia oranges. The year-over-year decline is part of a larger trend, which has been largely caused by hurricanes.
According to Mark Hudson with USDA NASS, “It’s even lower than the hurricane season of two years ago, when you look at 11.6 for all oranges compared to just two seasons ago when it was 15.82 million boxes. And even with— during Irma, Irma was 45 million boxes, compared to 11 million boxes, but you can understand we have less trees and also, the yields are not as high.”
Hudson says that he blames lower yields on citrus green disease, which has now been discovered across most of the state of Florida.
Payment totals alone do not show financial stress — production costs and net losses complete the picture.
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