USDA Addresses Change in Crop Estimate
The USDA National Agriculture Statistic Service (NASS) addressed Florida citrus growers at the recent meeting of the Florida Citrus Commission in Lakeland to provide an explanation for the 8-million-box decrease to the Florida citrus crop forecast.
Bob Terry, the Agricultural Statistics Administrator for NASS, said that a combination of weather and disease related events occurring throughout the past several years has led to the 2006–2007 orange crop size registering completely outside of historical levels used in the NASS crop estimation model.
The reduction announced in the March crop forecast is due primarily to tree numbers and fruit per tree. The 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons affected fruit-set, making fruit per tree uncharacteristically sporadic, while citrus canker caused a larger than anticipated rate of tree loss.
After noting the dramatic decrease to the original October 2006 forecast, NASS is now in the process of collecting new tree numbers for the top ten citrus-producing counties in Florida. This data should supply NASS with a more accurate attrition rate which will be applied to the estimation of the 2007–2008 crop.
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