Washington apple growers are finding the going tough for their record crop in the second half of the season.

According to US press reports, Washington’s producers have sold 57 per cent of the state’s total crop of 112 million boxes, but movement out of stores is slower than recent season averages and many export markets are facing their own economic woes, compounding the situation.

“The economics not only here in the US but in Mexico, our largest market, in Canada, our second-largest market, and then off-shore as well, have created and compounded this movement number,” Washington Apple Commission president Todd Fryhover told the US press.

April’s issue of the World Apple Report issues a similar warning. “Two of the largest import markets have become dramatically less attractive,” it stated.

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