The start of the Florida grapefruit season has been marred by heavy rainfall which is preventing growers from harvesting.
Matt Kastensmidt of IMG Citrus told The Packer that pickers were kept out of groves following several days of rainfall in late September. He said harvesting is running around two weeks later than last season, adding that he expected that harvesting in the Indian River would get underway in earnest by mid-October.
Despite being the world’s biggest grapefruit producer, Florida’s grapefruit industry has been in steep decline after being beset by a series of problems in the past decade, ranging from citrus canker, hurricanes and, most recently, citrus greening.
Production has plummeted from almost 41m cartons ten years ago to 15.6m cartons in 2013/14. Official forecast for the 2014/15 season are due to be released later this month.
