Florida Oranges Just One Industry FTAA May Destroy

by Mark Scheinbaum

The Miami Herald this week quoted Andrew Lavigne, chief of Florida Citrus Mutual, as saying straight out that a victory for FTAA means Brazil will be the only significant source of frozen orange juice concentrate. Of course, his dire prediction could make realtors, home builders, car dealers, road builders, and Wal-Mart shareholders smile.

Two generations ago citrus was king as far north as Ocala and Daytona Beach, and competed with cattle in Orlando and regions such as Clermont and Kissimmee for agricultural revenue. These days, Orange and Citrus counties only live up to their namesakes in Florida history books.

Depending upon the Florida crop in any given year, the so-called American frozen concentrated orange juice you purchase might have a hefty percentage of Brazilian fruit content.

Brazil has eclipsed Florida in many markets as the source of orange and grapefruit juice. Rising real estate and commercial land prices in Florida have relegated quality citrus to an ever-shrinking swath of land from Vero Beach to Lakeland, down to the northern shores of Lake Okeechobee and into a piece of Martin County. There are a few groves producing commercially in Palm Beach County, and a pocket of specialty citrus acreage -- key limes, lemons, limes -- in southern Miami-Dade County.

It wouldn't take much to push the remaining orange growers out. The water, air pollution, and infrastructure problems already facing Florida's aquifer, and its growing urban megalopolis, gravely threaten the remaining patches of citrus fruits. U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologists, studying Central Florida birds and wildlife, have annually reported a decline in whitetail deer, dove, turkey, and other populations. Ironically, only feral hogs -- feeding in suburban areas with fewer human hunters and natural predators -- seem to prosper. Since some of these wild pigs are diseased, their success at procreation is not a blessing for the state's environment.

The state has no "price controls" on Florida-grown citrus. One FTAA analyst has speculated that "free trade" for the Americas means a free flow of Brazilian citrus into the U.S. markets. If that happens, the orange and lemon groves will be turned into housing developments and gas stations. The Florida citrus industry will go the way of shoe companies that left New England, textile makers who left North Carolina, and television manufacturers who left all of the U.S. and Canada.