Strawberries’ popularity drives acreage growth
This year’s heavy rainfall throughout California posed a particular challenge for organic strawberry growers, said Craig Moriyama, director of berry operations for Naturipe Berry Growers, Salinas, Calif.
“Organics are much more sensitive to the rain because you can’t use fungicide,” he said.
Meanwhile, organic acreage continues to inch upward.
“We see organic increase each year,” said Anthony Gallino, vice president of sales for California Giant Berry Farms, Watsonville, Calif.
“You’re not seeing huge increase, but baby steps,” he said.
Growers are scrambling to come up with organic land.
“There are a lot of guys who are transitioning conventional ground into organic ground,” he said.
California has 3,307 acres of organic strawberries this season, according to the Watsonville-based California Strawberry Commission. That’s up from 2,989 acres in 2016.
Watsonville/Salinas has 2,295 acres (69%), Santa Maria has 534 acres (16%), Oxnard has 360 acres (11%) and Orange County/San Diego has 118 acres (4%).
Vancouver, British Columbia-based The Oppenheimer Group has an organic program in Watsonville, said Jason Fung, director of category development.
Organics are in strong demand at retail, he said.
“Consumers and the millennial generation are looking for something like that — especially in a field crop, like strawberries,” he said.
Los Angeles-based Eclipse Berry Farms LLC has some organic strawberries in Salinas and in Florida, said Stuart Gilfenbain, sales and marketing director.
So far, organic only accounts for about 5% of the company’s volume, but that should change.
Success Valley Produce LLC, Oxnard, has been involved in organic strawberries for more than 10 years, said Backus Nahas, director of marketing.
“We’ve been selling our organic production to our mainstream retailers the entire time,” he said.
But it’s becoming difficult to make money from organic strawberries at times because of competition from south of the border, he said.
“It seems to us that more and more ground in Baja California has been converted to organic,” Nahas said.
“We are finding it extremely difficult to have profitable organic production when we’re forced to compete with product out of Mexico at the same exact time,” he said.
Sustainability also is a concern of retailers, said Michelle Deleissegues, marketing director for Red Blossom Sales Inc., Salinas.
“We address it on a yearly basis with all of them,” she said, adding, “Our sustainability program continues to be monitored and updated.”