November 24, 2017
CapitalPress.com
Washington bullish on apples, survey shows
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
WENATCHEE, Wash. — A 34.5
percent increase in the number of ap-
ple trees in the ground over the last
six years and the first increase in to-
tal apple acreage in 16 years shows
the “fierce competitiveness” and the
“optimism” of the Washington apple
industry, a top analyst says.
A Washington Tree Fruit Acreage
Report issued Nov. 8 by USDA’s
National Agricultural Statistics Ser-
vice shows 179,146 acres of apple
trees in 2017. That’s the first uptick
since the peak of 192,000 acres in
2001. Acreage declined to 172,986
in 2006, reflecting years of poor
returns, and decreased further to
167,489 in 2011.
“That bucks the world trend. It’s
very significant because in the rest
of the major apple-producing re-
gions of the world acreage is falling
steadily and production is increasing
due to higher-density plantings and
increased yields,” says Desmond
O’Rourke, retired Washington State
University agricultural economist
and apple analyst.
Washington had been doing the
same thing for more than a decade
but in recent years is also adding
acreage, “which tells you the indus-
try is very optimistic,” he said.
The number and density of trees
per acre are seen as truer gauges
of production capacity growth than
acreage.
There are 126.5 million apple
trees in the ground in the state, up
34.5 percent from 94 million in
2011, which was up 25.3 percent
from 75 million in 2006. The densi-
ty of all apple plantings is now 706
trees per acre versus 562 in 2011,
434 in 2006 and 391 in 2001.
All of the trees and acreage push-
es the envelope of oversupply in
the face of labor shortages, federal
regulations and other challenges and
shows the “fierce competitiveness”
of the industry, O’Rourke said.
“The competition has always
been fierce. However, the stakes are
so much higher now because a few
retail buyers can control so much
volume. Walmart, Costco, Kroger,
Safeway-Albertsons and now Am-
azon-Whole Foods together handle
about half of all produce sales,” he
said. “It’s a huge battle getting in
with them.”
To do that, Washington’s big tree
fruit companies each want to offer
as much volume of commodity va-
rieties such as Gala and Fuji as pos-
sible while also providing several
small-volume, higher-margin club
varieties such as Envy, Pinata and
Kanzi, O’Rourke said.
In 2014, Dan Plath, orchard man-
ager of Washington Fruit & Produce
Co., Yakima, said the company had
been adding 500 acres of apple or-
chard annually for eight or nine
years with no plans to stop. Mc-
Dougall & Sons Inc. in Wenatchee
and Auvil Fruit Co. in Orondo are
among other companies aggressive-
ly adding acreage.
But the NASS survey indicates
the acreage race may be slowing.
It shows 6,177 apple acres planted
in 2016 versus 15,286 for 2014 and
2015, which is 7,643 per year.
The NASS survey was sent to
over 2,900 operations of five or
more acres of tree fruit and received
about 1,300 responses. The Wash-
ington Apple Commission, The Pear
Bureau Northwest, the Washington
State Fruit Commission, the Wash-
7
Nature’s Path
settles with
Washington
Ecology
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
Big growth in the number of trees coupled with the first uptick in apple acreage in years shows the competitiveness of the
Washington apple industry, an analyst says.
Washington tree fruit acres
Item
2001
2006
2011
2017
Apples
192,000
172,986
167,489
179,146
Cherries
29,000
36,000
38,115
42,198
Pears
28,000
25,200
22,008
20,965
Other*
7,100
6,250
5,564
4,905
Source: USDA NASS
*Includes peaches, nectarines, apricots, prunes and plums.
Capital Press graphic
ington State Tree Fruit Association
and USDA each paid $5,000 for the
survey, said B.J. Thurlby, fruit com-
mission president. Previous surveys
were in 2011, 2006, 2001, 1993,
1986 and 1948-49.
Jon DeVaney, president of the
Washington State Tree Fruit Asso-
ciation, said the trend toward larger,
more efficiently produced crops to
maximize returns is clear. High-den-
sity maximizes efficient of labor and
prepares orchards for mechanical
apple harvesting, he said.
“Most of the new trees going in
are newer varieties and there’s a lot
of acreage in transition to organic,”
DeVaney said. “So while production
is going up, it is increasing in ar-
eas where the market tells growers,
through strong pricing, that there’s
good demand.”
Organic production is 15,801
acres of apples with 4,200 in transi-
tion and 2,040 acres of cherries with
332 in transition.
By conventional apple vari-
ety, Gala leads at 41,036 acres and
31.5 million trees. Red Delicious is
39,207 acres and 14.3 million trees.
Fuji/Red Fuji is 28,718 acres and
22.3 million trees and Honeycrisp is
22,616 acres and 20.8 million trees,
more than doubling in acreage since
2011. Granny Smith is 16,267 acres
and 10.7 million trees.
The survey shows the Columbia
Basin and Yakima Valley leading the
Wenatchee District in apple acre-
age. Yakima and Wenatchee lead in
sweet cherry acreage and Wenatchee
far exceeding the other two in winter
and Bartlett pear acres.
By county, Yakima and Grant
lead in apple acres and trees planted.
Yakima and Chelan counties lead in
cherries. Chelan and Okanogan lead
in pears.
A big shortcoming of the NASS
report is that it excludes acreage and
tree data on more than 20 small-
er-volume and club varieties, O’Ro-
urke said.
That information was not pub-
lished to avoid disclosure of individ-
ual operations, NASS said.
Companies didn’t want their
competitors to know how many
acres of a given club variety they
have, O’Rourke said.
“It’s a very incomplete picture. I
guess the acreage is greater. There’s
no way to estimate how much great-
er,” he said.
The report does list acreage of
seven club varieties: Ambrosia, Au-
tumn Glory, Envy, Jazz, Kanzi, Opal
and Pacific Rose. But some appear
to be under reported by growers,
which they are free to do, O’Rourke
said.
For example, Jazz and Ambro-
sia are about equal in production
but Ambrosia nearly doubles Jazz
in acres and more than doubles it in
trees, he said.
Similarly, data was not published
on eight sweet cherry varieties, four
pear varieties, five apricot varieties,
seven nectarine varieties, nine peach
varieties seven prune and plum va-
rieties.
Pluots were estimated at 33 acres
and 9,792 trees with region and va-
riety levels not published due to dis-
closure rules.
All tree fruit totals 249,723 acres,
up 6.6 percent from 234,311 in 2011,
which was down 2.9 percent from
2006. The total number of trees is
144.5 million, up 31.6 percent from
109.8 million in 2011 which was up
22.2 percent from 2006.
Sweet cherries have been contin-
ually increasing since 1986. They
are at 42,198 acres, up 10.7 percent
from 38,115 in 2011.
“Cherries remain a super high-
risk crop. I think the acreage in-
crease is slowing now. There’s more
switch out of existing acres into
newer and high-density varieties and
some loss of acres to new apple vari-
eties,” Thurlby said.
With a record 15 million,
20-pound boxes of Northwest cher-
ries harvested in just July, growers
“want more than 4-ton-per-acre
Bing in that window,” he said.
The acreage of winter pears such
as d’Anjou and Bosc increased by 73
acres over the last six years, while
Bartlett pear acreage decreased.
Overall, pear acreage dropped 4.7
percent, from 22,008 to 20,965.
The Yakima Valley has a lot of
old pear trees susceptible to pear
psylla, Thurlby said. Growers are
replacing them with apples or other
crops.
On the flip side, a shortage of
processing pears has led to stable,
high prices for Bartletts for process-
ing, and Bartletts are gaining in the
fresh market, he said.
Peaches, nectarines and prunes-
plums have declined in acreage
since 2001. They now stand at 2,179,
1,191 and 247 acres, respectively.
The “buy local” movement has
led to a proliferation of small, lo-
cal peach production throughout
the Midwest, pressuring traditional
peach states such as Georgia, South
Carolina, California and Washing-
ton, Thurlby said.
Demand for Italian prunes
dropped, causing a loss of acres,
but now demand exceeds supply, he
said.
Apricots hit a low of 1,100 acres
in 2006 and have now increased
to 1,288 acres. They are making a
comeback with two newer varieties,
Robada and Rival, which are beauti-
ful in color, taste good and produce
well, Thurlby said. Their timing is
good after California apricots, so
there is demand for them, he said.
The NASS report is useful for
growers and packer-shipper-market-
ers, government officials and sup-
pliers of packaging, chemicals and
pesticides to analyze trends.
Organic foodmaker Nature’s
Path has agreed to spend an es-
timated $29,800 for a park and
stormwater treatment project in
Blaine, Wash., to settle a claim by
the Department of Ecology that
it violated its permit to discharge
wastewater.
The company, based across
the Canadian border in Rich-
mond, British Columbia, denied
any wrongdoing, but agreed to
the resolution to avoid further
litigation, according to settlement
documents.
“Nature’s Path is very pleased
that the DOE dismissed our case
and accepted our 2016 appeal that
enables us to make significant en-
vironmental reports to Blaine,”
the company vice president for
operations, Peter Dierx, said in a
written statement.
Ecology fined Nature’s Path
$22,000 a year ago, alleging that
the company’s records showed
it discharged acidic wastewater
from its Blaine plant. The com-
pany said faulty equipment mis-
recorded pH levels and appealed
the fine to the Pollution Control
Hearings Board. The settlement
ends the appeal.
Nature’s Path agreed to spend
$20,000 to buy two lots along
Caine Creek in Blaine for a city
park.
The company also will spend
$3,000 for clean up and resto-
ration, including removing weeds
and planting trees. The agree-
ment calls for Nature’s Path to
provide work parties next spring
and in 2019.
The company also will spend
$1,000 on park signs and another
$800 for ongoing garbage pickup
and a three-year supply of bags to
dispose of pet waste.
Nature’s Path will also con-
tribute $5,000 to a city project to
treat stormwater going into Dray-
ton Harbor.
The company in August sub-
mitted a report to Ecology on
improvements to the wastewater
treatment system at the plant. Ac-
cording to the report, fat, oil and
grease interfered with equipment
measuring pH levels in wastewa-
ter.
The plant has been in compli-
ance with standards for pH levels
since January, according to the
settlement.
“We’re pleased to see this ex-
cellent progress at Nature’s Path
facility and these valuable en-
hancements for the city.” Ecolo-
gy’s Northwest regional director
Tom Buroker said in a written
statement. “We value this part-
nership because the assistance
to the city goes above what
our penalty assessed and, more
importantly, beyond what’s re-
quired to comply with the per-
mit.”
The
150,000-square-foot
processing and packaging plant
opened in 1999. The plant pro-
duces approximately 750,000
pounds of cereal, granola and
bars in a week, according to the
company’s report.
47-1/102