This year's California pomegranate crop will likely have less fruit than last year's crop, and growers are pointing to a higher percentage of cracked fruit during harvest as a reason for that.
“It's been a shorter crop than expected,” said Jeff Simonian of the Simonian Fruit Company. “Back in August, we thought it would be big, but fruit started cracking in the field and didn't pack well, so it's come in below early estimates.” Simonian explained that some cracking was likely due to unseasonably warm weather and lots of sun, and a long dry spell throughout the state didn't help.
“We're about 20 to 25 percent down from last year,” said Simonian. “But, industry-wide, it varies from grower to grower, with some being down 20 percent from last year and some being down 50 percent.” The good news is that, with the fruit that made it to retailers, sizes have been larger than normal. Peak sizes are usually around 30, but this year sizes have hovered closer to 24. Pricing, however, hasn't made up for a crop with lower volume.
“Prices were fairly low all year, because we were gearing up for a large crop,” said Simonian. “But when everyone realized it was going to be a short crop, the market didn't recover, so we've had lower prices this year.”
For more information:
Jeff Simonian
Simonian Fruit Company
+1 559 834 5921