Onion acreage is down in Texas, and the mid-February freeze will take another bite out of the crop.
In February, the South Texas Onion Committee reported onion acreage in the 35 counties that make up the regulated marketing order area was about 5,000 acres, off from about 6,000 acres last year, according to Dante Galeazzi, manager of the South Texas Onion Committee and CEO and president of the Texas International Produce Association.
Industry leaders have estimated yield damage of 15% to 30% to south Texas onions because of the mid-February freeze, he said.
Marketing push
The committee will again promote south Texas onions again this year, though the U.S. Department of Agriculture is in the process of determining its fate after an October 2020 referendum failed to garner two-thirds (67%) support from the industry necessary for the marketing order to continue without further review and USDA approval.
With 60% approval, the marketing order did receive majority industry support, Galeazzi said. The USDA is expected to gather further public input from the industry in the next few months about the marketing order and then report those findings in an executive report.
In a decision that may not happen until 2022, the agriculture secretary will then decide to keep, suspend or eliminate the marketing order, he said.
During the 2019-20 season, marketing efforts included:
- Creation of a new website, www.tx1015.com;
- Two unique full-page ads and four smaller variational advertisements promoting Texas onions;
- One unique recipe and full-page advertisement for “Texas onion quiche”;
- Nine articles/stories featuring Texas onions across six publications;
- Five digital or print ads in four different marketing channels promoting Texas onions across seven months (starting October 2019 through April 2020);
- 461,908 digital impressions from e-mail advertisements, resulting in 1532 click-throughs;
- Over 1,400 site visits to the www.tx1015.com promotional website from Jan. 1, 2020, to June 1; and
- Three marketing channels alone provided visibility to 20,500 print subscribers and nearly 140,000 digital subscribers.
