The South African citrus industry has announced a lower crop forecast for 2011 after record volumes were shipped last year. The drop is due to unfavourable weather in the north of the country which resulted in hail damage in some areas, while in the south growers in the Citrusdal region report lower fruit set.
The Citrus Growers Association said it expects that 94.5m (15kg) cartons will be ‘packed and passed’ for export in 2011. “This is 4.5 per cent down on 2010’s record crop of 99m cartons, and similar to the 2008 export volume of 94.2m cartons,” said the CGA’s Justin Chadwick.
The CGA normally makes a distinction between what is packed and passed for export and the volume finally exported at the end of the season. Often more fruit is packed and passed for export than the volume that’s eventually shipped.
The grapefruit forecast is put at 14.5m (17kg) cartons compared to 12.5m cartons in 2010. Red grapefruit production is estimated to reach 10.7m cartons, up 18 per cent on 2010’s 9.1m cartons, and slightly up on 2009’s volume of 10.1m cartons. White grapefruit shows a slight recovery compared to last year’s 1.9m cartons, but continues the decline of the past few years.
Lemon production is more or less on a par with last season when 9.6m cartons were exported, but after some years of sustained growth the navel crop will be 15 per cent lower. Valencia production is set to drop by 8 per cent compared to last year’s record volume of 46.5m cartons, with a total volume of 42.9m cartons predicted for 2011.
“To put this into perspective, South African orange volumes will drop by 106,000 tonnes,” says Mr Chadwick. “The average annual orange exports over the past seven years from Uruguay were 77,000 tonnes, from Australia 114,000 tonnes, from Chile 27,000 tonnes and from Argentina 143,000 tonnes.”
Meanwhile, the soft citrus export season is already under way, with the Satsuma season starting earlier than last year. Satsuma production will increase by 13 per cent to 2.12m cartons, mainly due to new plantings maturing in the Nelspruit region and a recovery in the Patensie region of the Eastern Cape, which has suffered from water shortages in recent years.
On the other hand, clementine volumes are down by 8 per cent, while mandarins are expected to increase by 14 per cent. The CGA’s soft citrus focus group estimates that the 3.1m cartons of mandarins will be made up of Novas (1.1m cartons), late mandarins (1.7m cartons) and other mandarin types (250,000 cartons). Most of the increase in mandarin volumes comes from the Eastern Cape region.
The total soft citrus category is expected to deliver an export volume of 7.9m cartons, which is 5 per cent up on the 2010 volume.
Meanwhile, producers in the Western Cape and Northern Cape who qualify to export their fruit to the US said their crops could be 20 per cent down on last year. However, the number of cartons packed could equal or exceed last year’s figures because this is “a big fruit year”.
“There is a decline of about 20 per cent across the board,” said Gerrit van der Merwe, chairman of the Western Cape Citrus Producers’ Forum. “But this will be more than offset by the fact that the fruit has been sizing so well, and by the warm summer which will contribute to high sugars.”
In 2010, the South African citrus industry shipped just over 41,000 pallets to the US compared to the previous year’s 33,000 pallets. “Despite the ongoing recession, the US market absorbed more fruit in 2010,” said Mr van der Merwe. “South Africa and Chile exported an extra 12,600 tonnes of easy peelers and 18,200 tonnes more oranges between them.”
Growers in the northern part of South Africa are also getting ready to ship their fruit to the US once they have received clearance from the US authorities. While it is not certain when this will happen, producers in the region are increasingly investing in black spot free plant material to be ready to enter the market.
“The world recession is not over,” cautioned Mr van der Merwe in reference to the future prospects in the US market. “There will need to be a continued focus on quality and regular delivery, and South African growers should expect more fruit from California in future which will affect the start and finish of the South African season.”
