11/14/07 Pear Update Part 2

Pear Update Part 2. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. Last years northwest pear crop suffered due to a damaging hail storm but this year's crop seems to have come back. According to Kevin Moffitt, Executive Director of Pear Bureau Northwest, the crop is up a bit from 2 years ago and prices are holding. MOFFITT: Based on what I see from the USDA they seem to holding up very well. USDA reports the D'Anjou and Bartlett pears in the 20 and 22 price range mostly for the prime sizes in the domestic market and that's a pretty good range if we could stay there throughout the season. Moffitt says movement has been very good on the export market. MOFFITT: We have been able to get very good movement early on our Bartlett's but also on our exports and our exports have been quite robust if I may use that word. We're seeing some good early movement in Brazil. That's a market that will take Bartlett's and we're seeing significant amounts of Bartlett's going down there. Right now Brazil is probably our number 2 market just behind Mexico in terms of shipments to date The Pear Bureau has been aggressively marketing pears around the globe and as we reported a couple of weeks ago has been involved in a promotion with Disney World in Orlando. MOFFITT: We're bringing growers in to sample during this Epcot event so the growers are able to talk to the consumers about pears and consumers can see who's growing the pears that they buy and that's really great. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.