Orange Prices Not as High as Expected After Damaging Winter Freeze

Last December’s destructive freeze hasn’t pushed orange prices nearly as high as had been expected, but grocers said consumers are buying fewer of them anyway, put off by prices hovering around $1 a pound and the uneven quality of the state’s navel crop.

A four-day freeze in California’s Central Valley destroyed about three-quarters of the state’s navel orange crop, boosting prices about 40% from before the freeze. The state supplies about 80% of the country’s oranges consumed as fruit.

Consumers can expect lower prices for oranges soon, as Valencia oranges ripen and replace navel oranges nearing the end of their season. But prices are likely to remain above last year’s levels since about 40% of the state’s Valencia crop was also damaged in the freeze, growers said.

Grocers said they have had to coax consumers reluctant to purchase oranges by handing out samples of the fruit.

“The quality was good, but not as good as it has been,” said Jack Brown, chief executive of Colton-based Stater Bros., which owns 112 Southern California grocery stores. “Some had internal damage you couldn’t see from the outside.”

Representatives of several grocery chains said they did not run out of navel oranges, but in some cases supplemented the supply with fruit from outside the state. Fruit wholesalers said Florida and Texas oranges usually used for juice were sold as fruit. And the government estimates that 60,000 tons of oranges will be imported from Australia, Mexico, South America and elsewhere during the 12 months ending October 1999, a 50% increase from last year’s 40,000 tons.

Grocers and growers said lower consumer demand for oranges and an influx of oranges from outside the state kept price increases under control.

Some grocery chains, having received complaints about the navel crop, are taking a wait-and-see attitude toward the state’s Valencia crop. Albertson’s, for example, is waiting to see if the quality of the Valencia oranges is up to par. They have not yet decided whether to buy Valencias from California or Texas.

But officials at Lucky Stores said the chain will stock California Valencia oranges, at least until mid-summer when they will begin supplementing them with Australian navel oranges.

News of the damage caused navel orange prices to skyrocket earlier this year. Some retailers paid $20 to $25 for a 37-pound carton, up from $8 or $9 the previous year, according Shann Blue, California Citrus Mutual’s director of grower services.

Prices eventually edged down between $14 to $18 a carton as the hysteria died down and the surviving crop was found to be slightly larger than expected, he said. Similarly, retail prices dropped from as high as $2 a pound to under $1 in many cases, as foreign and out-of-state growers and packers jumped in to fill the gap.

Meanwhile, Central Valley farmers are trying to salvage the last of their badly damaged crop.

Nick Hill, who grows citrus in Orange Cove, 30 miles east of Fresno, said he expects to salvage only 15% of the Valencias he grows, after losing 80% of his navel orange crop.

“With crop insurance, we made back about half of our production costs, but we won’t make any money this year.”

Indeed, most farmers in the region will only be able to recoup a fraction of their costs for the year. And many packing house workers and pickers in the Central Valley will be left without a job for the summer season. But officials at Sunkist Growers, the large cooperative, said they know of no Central Valley growers or packers forced out of business.