Agriculture Today - December 2007
The citrus industry is back!
By: Cassie Dellaganna
FCFB Intern
They’re back! It’s a whole new citrus season and the industry is bouncing back from January’s devastating freeze.
In mid-January, early estimates of freeze damage forecasted up to $1 billion in losses industry-wide. Within the next few months, the U.S. Department of Agriculture designated 18 counties, including Fresno County, as primary natural disaster areas. In mid-March, President Bush signed a declaration of major disaster for California counties suffering freeze damage.
For Fresno County, the final counts of actual citrus loss/damage was approximately $117,842,592.
One local packer that was impacted by last winter’s freeze was Sunny Cove Citrus in Orange Cove. However, despite the hard times brought on by the freeze things are looking good this season at Sunny Cove Citrus. Tom Clark, president of Sunny Cove, is optimistic for this year’s crop. “Overall, things look very good,” he said. Clark talked about the increase in “marketable value,” which essentially means having more of the product to market.
For many in the citrus industry hurt by the freeze, it will take about three-to-five years to fully recover, but they are well on their way. Because of experiences in the past -- and for some learning the hard way -- most citrus producers and packers were prepared for the freeze. Most packers have purchased business interruption insurance to protect themselves in the event of a natural disaster. Growers have similar insurance packages that are government insurance packages with disaster level policies. According to Clark, Sunny Cove Citrus is still paying back a small business administration loan that they had to take out from the 1998 freeze.
The long-term effects on the citrus trees are minimal. The mandarins and oranges are very hardy and show little effect by the freeze, and are now back to normal production, said Clark. But there are lasting effects to the lemons. This is because lemons are much more susceptible to cold weather and the damage can “stick with the trees much longer” than do the mandarins and oranges. Clark says it will take the lemons a bit longer to fully recover to original production.
Clark also is optimistic for the sales and shelf space available for this year’s product. He doesn’t think that the industry lost long-term shelf space to other produce this past January. While he acknowledges there were empty shelves after the freeze and that they were filled with other produce, he does not believe that it was permanently lost.
The industry first experienced shelf-space loss with the big freeze of 1990. Another freeze in 1998 resulted in the loss of additional shelf space. The retailers were forced to look for and buy products where they could find them, said Clark. Buyers even looked offshore for the products, and imports from Spain were shipped in to fill the shelves. However, this year there has been a great increase of major retailers wanting to promote the citrus industry, a major one being Wal Mart. With the support of the retailers, the citrus industry is looking very good this year.
Despite the freezes early in the year, this new season is off to a more profitable start for the citrus industry. In Orange Cove, Sunny Cove Citrus employees are hard at work packing thousands of pieces of fruit, and will ship their products all over the U.S. and overseas. About 30 percent of their volume will be shipped to Southeast Asia and Korea.
Despite a rough start in 2007 for the citrus industry, it’s a whole new crop this season and they are back!