Valley Citrus Notes

While it has not shown up on the SENESICA website as yet, it has been announced that citrus greening is spreading in Mexico. Recent announcements include the detection of hot psyllids in Sonora, just south of Cd. Obregon, and in Baja California del Sur, near Cabo San Lucas. Additionally, the disease has been detected in the state of Hidalgo, which is north of Mexico City. Hot psyllids were suspected but unconfirmed in the State of Vera Cruz, so further samplings and tests are underway.

Thus, the disease is getting closer and closer to the California and Arizona citrus industries, and may be getting closer to Texas. To date, the large industries in northeastern Mexico (Cd. Victoria and Montemorelos areas) have apparently remained free of both hot psyllids and the disease itself.

I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me sooner, but someone asked about the volume of fruit that our industry might have lost to the self-imposed moratorium on shipping to California during seven-weeks last November and December. I compared the TVCC data for shipments in that period with the average for the five prior seasons.

In terms of total volume for all citrus, the numbers came in at a reduction of some 275,000 carton equivalents during our moratorium, with over 92 percent of that being grapefruit. While that doesn’t seem like an awful lot, shippers were under the gun to try to move about the same volume of fruit as normal, and they necessarily tried to put more of our production during that period into our other markets—which were really not set up to receive substantially more volume.

According to the old supply and demand rule of economics, a greater supply does not lead to a greater demand; rather oversupply leads to lower prices. So, we saw both a reduction in total volume and an overall lower pricing structure. The unfortunate result was that when the moratorium was lifted a couple of days before Christmas, prices did not recover as well as we might have expected or hoped.

Sales of the 2010-11 grapefruit juice and by-products have been going very well this season. Processing efficiency was up because of volume, and prices of both juice and by-products have been good. The result is that TCX has announced that it intends to make an advance payment on the pool this week. Checks in the amount of $20.00 per ton will be mailed to the participating packinghouses in the next couple of days.

If you are keeping track, TCX paid $40 per ton to the packinghouses at delivery (the spot price), less the service fee ($6.56 per ton after volume discount rebates), so this $20.00 advance brings the total to a couple of decimal places more than $53.44 per ton for your grapefruit eliminations that went to TCX.

If you liked your juice returns for 2009-10 (nearly $100 per ton), you should be pleased that the return for 2010-11 looks to be a little better.

This is the final issue of this newsletter, as I will officially retire as of midnight tonight. While I did consider continuing to write this newsletter for another few months, Texas A&M System policy dictates the termination of my email account—so be it. The citrus website will not disappear, but it will not be updated.

I started my Extension career in Tarrant County (Ft. Worth) on March 1, 1973, transferred to the Florida Cooperative Extension Service on January 1, 1975, and then came to Weslaco on March 1, 1980. Thus, my Extension career has spanned 38.5 continuous years—and it has been a good ride.

I don’t have any regrets about my decision to retire—it is time. For those who are wondering if the current budgetary crisis in Texas caused my position to be RIFed, it was not—though the effect is the same in that my position will not be re-filled, a fact of which I have been aware for many years.

I have no plans to relocate—but then, I had no thoughts of retirement six months ago, so anything is possible. I still have a son in high school and I still have a grove to manage, plus other responsibilities.

For those who made it to my retirement celebration and/or contributed to it, I thank you.

JULIAN W. SAULS, Ph.D.
Professor & Extension Horticulturist
2401 East Highway 83
Weslaco TX 78596

THE INFORMATION GIVEN HEREIN IS FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. REFERENCE TO COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS OR TRADE NAMES IS MADE WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT NO DISCRIMINATION IS INTENDED AND NO ENDORSEMENT BY AGRILIFE EXTENSION IS IMPLIED.