Florida citrus volume will be up this year, and industry leaders were pleased with the outlook in mid-November.
“Our volume is definitely up this year,” said Steven Callaham, CEO of Dundee Citrus Growers Association.
Citrus groves have avoided damaging hurricanes, and the weather has been cooperating with growers, he said.
“We have an uptick in volume, and fruit quality is looking very good this year,” he said.
Packing of Florida citrus started in mid-October, said Derek Rodgers, director of sales and marketing with Florida Classic Growers, which is owned by Dundee Citrus Growers Association and is the exclusive marketer of the Florida Classic label.
“Movement has been good, and prices have been good,” he said. “Quality has been excellent, and we’re seeing that flow through at the store level, which has been great.”
Rodgers said citrus packouts have been high, and the fruit is clean with excellent internal and external quality.
While fresh citrus volume or oranges and grapefruit will be up this season, the gains will be relatively moderate, Rodgers said, with fruit drop caused by citrus greening still likely for later this season in some groves.
Industry expectations fall generally in line with the USDA’s crop production report pointing to increased production this year, said Matt Joyner, executive vice president and CEO of Florida Citrus Mutual.
“I think everybody’s fairly optimistic about the crop, given what we went through in 2022,” he said. Two hurricanes and a freeze held back production last year, but this year the state’s 2,000 citrus growers are forecast to produce almost 5 million cartons than last season.
“We’re glad to see some more fruit on the trees,” he said.
In Florida, there are about seven processors and 12 to 15 packinghouses, Joyner estimated.
Florida Citrus Mutual works on issues important to growers, including citrus greening, pest and disease mitigation, and grower-related regulations at the state and federal levels.
“We have seen a lot of progress in terms of [citrus greening] research that has yielded some therapies and what we think will be helpful tools for the grower and their productivity,” Joyner said, referring to plant-growth regulators and antimicrobials, as well as rootstock varieties that are more tolerant to citrus greening.
“Trees are looking better than they’ve probably looked in 10 years,” Joyner said. “There is a lot of optimism out there with some of the strategies that researchers have come up with and some of the advances in breeding. We really have the opportunity to start climbing out of this hole that we’ve gotten in and start stabilizing and rebuilding the industry.”
Outlook
Grapefruit supply will be consistent through March and possibly into April, said Callaham of Dundee Citrus Growers Association. Valencias will begin in early February and continue into June, he said.
Dundee Citrus Growers Association has partnered with Riverfront Packing on Vero Beach, Callaham said.
“The Scott family that owns Riverfront are some of the finest growers in the state, and they’ve expanded their volume and taken on some additional growers this year, which has increased our volume of Indian River grapefruit,” he said. “Then, of course, we have the interior part of the state, the CUPS (Citrus Under Protective Screen), the majority of [which] is grapefruit. “
Riverfront Packing complements Dundee Citrus well, Callaham said.
“That has allowed us to really expand our offer offerings in the market to take on some additional customers and take on additional volume with existing customers,” he said. “It has been nice to have that increase in volume and very good quality, both internally and externally.”
Domestic demand for grapefruit has been robust this year. Fresh grapefruit is also being moved to export channels.
For Dundee Citrus, the momentum toward CUPS fruit continues to grow, Callaham said.
“I would say that we’re checking all the boxes and hitting all the marks that we projected,” he said.
Relative to the quality of the fruit, Callaham said Dundee Citrus is “extremely pleased” with CUPS citrus production so far. Dundee Citrus has 500 acres planted and another 500 acres under construction.
“By the spring of 2025, we will have 1,000 acres planted,” he said.
For the 2023-24 season, Dundee Citrus will be harvesting from about 300 acres, Callaham said.
The CUPS is method is designed to exclude the Asian citrus psyllid and keep trees free from citrus greening; that has been achieved, he said.
“It is not just keeping the trees disease-free, it is allowing us to do more with less,” he said. “We’re able to produce so much more with less of a footprint ...” Callaham said. He estimated that the CUPS method can produce a piece of fruit with about 80% less land, water and fertilizer than a conventional grove. “There’s a great story behind what we are doing.”
The CUPS fruit is under the Eco-Grown Citrus umbrella from Dundee Citrus, with the Rubies label for red grapefruit.
“Right now, we only have red grapefruit, but we are having a discussion about other grapefruit varieties as well,” Callaham said.
Dundee Citrus also is in the process of constructing a large-scale variety trial with CUPS. That will allow Dundee Citrus to trial more kinds of grapefruit, oranges, mandarins and other types of specialty citrus, he said.
“For our organization, it’s really given us something to be extremely optimistic about [for] the future,” Callaham said.
“It’s been hard to find optimism in the Florida citrus industry, and I think we’ve been able to find it and it’s a good feeling,” he continued. “This is a sustainable solution for us and our growers.”
