Maimi – Florida’s orange production will plunge 21 percent to a 71-year low after damage wrought by Hurricane Irma devastated the harvest, while output of cotton also suffered in storm-hit areas, government figures showed.
Orange growers in Florida, the largest U.S. producer, will harvest 54 million boxes in the 2017-18 marketing year, the least since 1947 — an era when citrus irrigation was rare — the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a report Thursday. A survey of analysts conducted by Bloomberg indicated a crop of 58.2 million boxes. A box weighs 90 pounds, or 41 kilograms.
Irma, which dropped as much as 17 inches of rain on citrus- growing areas in a 24-hour period, made it impossible for farmers to reach their groves, with trees destroyed and fruit dropping to the ground unharvested, the USDA said.
Cotton yields also declined in states battered by Irma in September and Hurricane Harvey, which hit Texas and the Gulf Coast about two weeks earlier. Estimated productivity in Texas, the biggest U.S. grower of the fiber, fell to 745 pounds per acre from 757 pounds predicted in September, with much of the state’s growing area unaffected by Harvey. Georgia, which was in Irma’s path, saw yields fall to 900 pounds per acre, down from an estimated 1,013 pounds.
