Monte Nesbitt is a good man to have as the speaker at the Gulf Coast Citrus Show. Here is an aricle about Monte, that shows just one aspect of what he has done for the citrus industry. Monte also works in many other types of horticulture;
http://www.alfafarmers.org/neighbors/neighborsStory.phtml?id=4554
FRESH VISION: Satsuma Study Shifts Focus To Fresh-Market Appeal
By Darryal Ray
Researcher Monte Nesbitt, left, and grower Brian Ladnier believe the future is bright for satsuma.
Theres more than one way to peel an orange, and more than one way to sell satsumas.
So when Alabamas satsuma growers were told that they wouldnt be able to squeeze out a profit with juice, they began looking for a better way to sell their fruit.
The answer, many believe, could be a packaging plant not the processing plant many had envisioned that would sort, grade, label and box or bag the fruit for the fast-growing fresh market.
The change in plans came about as the result of a feasibility study to determine the potential value of a cooperative processing plant. The $31,500 study commissioned by the Satsuma Steering Committee of the Alabama Farmers Federations Horticulture Division, was part of a larger Value-Added Producer Grant issued by the United States Department of Agriculture.
But the results of the study were not what growers expected. In its executive summary of the study, a processing facility to turn the fruit into juice or concentrate was called very risky due to the lack of volume needed and other factors.
That was the bad news. The good news came near the end of that summary which concluded a satsuma supply and marketing cooperative might be an attractive option for the industry.
It was almost an anecdote in the report, said Monte Nesbitt, senior research associate with Auburn Universitys Gulf Coast Research and Extension Center in Fairhope. But that made a lot of sense to me.
Even before the study was completed, the markets landscape had changed, largely because of an unexpected deal with C.H. Robinson Worldwide (CHRW), one of North Americas largest trucking companies. Through that agreement, much of last seasons 350,000-pound harvest was shipped in 3-pound bags to Wal-Mart stores throughout the Southeast region.
They fell in our lap, said Nesbitt. They said, We can sell all the fruit you can provide. But we cant provide it because we dont have the infrastructure. They would like to see us get to 1 million pounds as soon as possible.
Right now, however, Nesbitt estimates Alabamas 40 growers most of whom are mom-and-pop operations that sell from roadside stands are producing only about 390 tons, or 780,000 pounds. But in less than a decade, the yield could be as much as 4.6 million pounds, or more than double the states peach output.
You cant tease a big chain store in New Jersey with 10,000 pounds of fruit, said Nesbitt. Theyre not going to get interested in a product that you cant continue to deliver to them. And thats where we are: Can we become big boys in providing the product and stream it out? Were not there yet with the growing capacity of our trees (satsuma trees bear more fruit the older they get), and were not there yet with infrastructure. Its chicken-and-egg: we could sell more fruit if we had the infrastructure, but how do we get the infrastructure until we sell the fruit?
The infrastructure that satsuma growers are hoping for would be an 80-by-80 building that would house graders, packers and cold storage, capable of handling such large demand.
The way we operated last year, we stored them on trucks and then moved them out, said Brian Ladnier of Grand Bay, who has 1,058 trees planted and has propagated as many 3,000 more in a year. The trouble we ran into last year with cold storage was being able to rotate the product first in, first out kind of deal. Youd have to empty an entire truck and to do that, you need the right equipment like a forklift and pallet jack. Its a big deal to empty a truck.
Ladnier says the facility may only be needed during harvest (early November through New Years), and could possibly be shared with another commodity such as peaches. That seems to be the way we are leaning, said Ladnier. People in the industry will eventually want their own facility, but we need something for the next two to three, maybe next five years, to get us to that point.
Other hurdles the growers face include developing a more uniformly sized product (the size of the satsuma fruit can vary widely on a single tree). There has to be some understanding that not everything that grows on the tree is going to be saleable, said Nesbitt.
Overcoming a resistance by backyard growers could also be a challenge. A lot of people have established local markets, and theyre not ready to give that up and go into a cooperative deal where they have to hustle and pick fruit in a short amount of time, said Nesbitt.
So we have people who are not evolving yet in that direction but I think they will be forced to as more and more competition and more and more trees get into production.
Too, Nesbitt says growers in Mobile and Baldwin counties are separated by more than interstate theres also a polarization that could make choosing a location for a packing facility difficult.
Thats a challenge for growers, and I dont know why it is a challenge. We dont have all our industry up here in the same immediate area. Theres a cluster of growers in Grand Bay and theres some in Baldwin County, Nesbitt said. Maybe this will be a good enough opportunity that economics will bring them together.
It is, Nesbitt stressed, the one golden opportunity that was almost missed in the feasibility study. He just hopes the growers will work together to get a packaging facility in time for the 2010 harvest, adding that C.H. Robinson Worldwide is already preparing marketing material to pitch this years crop to Wal-Mart.
Theyve come along at the right time, and if we are able to show growth, they are going to stay interested, Nesbitt said. If we get kind of wishy washy and cant continue to show increase in product, I think theyll lose interest. So, what does Wal-Mart want? Theyre going to want more and more fruit. So, its all right there if we can have a facility and the capability to get it out. And that means the growers will have to work together. We dont have a single grower who can meet this demand. For this to work, everybody will have to work together.
Millet (795-)
