Florida’s struggling citrus industry received some heartening news Tuesday as the orange forecast has increased for the current season. The U.S. Department of Agriculture released a monthly forecast predicting that this year’s Florida orange harvest will be enough to fill an estimated 76 million 90-pound boxes, an increase of 5 million boxes from the March forecast.
The forecast is the second consecutive month in which the numbers have increased. Still, even with the revised forecast, the season remains on pace to be among the worst for the citrus industry in five decades. Florida orange growers, who have seen annual yields diminish due in large part to citrus greening disease, filled 96.94 million boxes during the 2014-2015 season.
The harvest has gone down from 133.6 million boxes in the 2012-2013 growing season and 104.7 million boxes in the 2013-2014 season. Meanwhile, the new forecast for grapefruit production this year held at 10.7 million boxes, the same as in March.
“Today’s news is encouraging,” Shannon Shepp, executive director of the Florida Department of Citrus, said in a prepared statement. “We must remember this is still an industry in crisis. Production costs are at an all-time high and there is less Florida orange juice to go around.”
The latest forecast came a week after Gov. Rick Scott backed a group of influential growers who have called for the Bartow-based Department of Citrus to squeeze operations and reduce the “box” tax that growers pay.