Apple Industry Update

Apple Industry Update. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

Once apples are picked a lot of them go into storage so that there are fresh apples available all year long. Mark Seetin, Director of Regulatory and Industry Affairs for U.S. Apple Association discusses their latest storage survey.

SEETIN: This is as of November 1 and keep in mind that even in what you would call a normal year, November is the first report. It’s the early one. Probably 9 out of the last 10 years it occurs when harvest is still going on and of course this year in the west coast and the east coast it’s the same situation that both of them are still wrapping up their harvest but the bottom line is in terms of the fresh apple holdings as reported to us by storages throughout the U.S. we are about 105.5 million bushels. Compared to last year about a 2% increase.

He says that is holding pretty steady.

SEETIN: The holdings identified for processing are at about 35.6 million. That’s a little bit lower than last year. Again it’s hard to know, generally the December one figures reflect a complete, a much more complete crop that we have. But it looks like a good crop and it’s pretty consistent with what we’ve seen in USDA projections as far as the 2011 crop.

The next report will be done on December 1st and will have a better, clearer picture of the holdings. More tomorrow.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.