A new forecast from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has pegged this season's Florida citrus crop at 140m boxes, a reduction of 3m boxes on the previous estimate, impacted by smaller fruit size and the early effects of December's cold snap.
According to the USDA, early and midseason varieties are also down by 1m boxes to 67m boxes, while the projection for Valencias has decreased 2m boxes to a total of 73m boxes.
For Florida specialty fruit, the USDA's tangelo estimate was reduced by 100,000 boxes to 1m boxes, while the tangerine forecast fell to 4.2m boxes, down 200,000 boxes.
The USDA for grapefruit remained unchanged, however, with the state expected to produce 19.6m boxes of the fruit.
'The new estimate reflects fruit size which was smaller than anticipated and some preliminary effects of December's cold weather,' said Michael Sparks, executive vice-president and CEO of grower organisation Florida Citrus Mutual. 'While the industry as a whole came through the cold in decent shape, we did have frozen fruit and leaf damage across most of the growing regions as well as more extensive damage in a few select areas, and this report reflects that.
'No doubt there will be more changes to the monthly crop estimate reports as we move through the remainder of the season and the freeze damage becomes more apparent,' he added.
