-February 3,2023-
With the price to growers for the 2022 walnut crop at about 40 cents per pound or less—well below last year’s break-even price of 70 to 90 cents per pound—walnut groves are coming out this winter
Walnut farmers are tearing out older trees and less desirable varieties as the price for the nut has plummeted well below the cost of production, causing some growers to rethink walnuts and look for alternative crops.
“I’ve seen several younger orchards that have come out already in Fresno, Merced and Madera counties,” said Kings County farmer Brian Medeiros of Hanford, who farms walnuts, almonds and row crops. “My neighbor had a walnut orchard that was about six years old, and he tore the whole thing out. He just said, ‘I’m losing money hand over fist. I’m not going to keep doing it.’”
A heat wave last September cooked the walnuts on the trees during a critical time of the growing cycle. High temperatures were followed by rain that led to mold problems.
“We had extremely high temperatures—up to 117 degrees for three to four days in some areas—and this occurred when walnuts were at their most sensitive stage in growth,” said Robert Verloop, president and chief executive officer of the California Walnut Board and California Walnut Commission. The Commission conducted their own survey suggesting that handlers opening up 100 pounds of walnuts will find 30 to 40 pounds absolutely not usable.
With the price to growers for the 2022 walnut crop at about 40 cents per pound or less—and well below last year’s break-even price of between 70 and 90 cents per pound—walnuts were the obvious choice for removal for Medeiros, he said. He pulled out 16 acres of walnut trees to scale down his water use to comply with groundwater regulations and manage his allotment.
“Our orchard is only 15 years old, so when I was pulling out those 16 acres, it literally broke my heart because I’m pulling out beautiful trees that look gorgeous, and I’m bulldozing them over,” Medeiros said.
“The (walnut) price is making it much easier, much quicker for us to move ahead because—unless this price changes dramatically in the coming year or we have some outstanding support from USDA—we’re probably pulling the rest of them out next year.”
Affecting the demand-supply problem is a carryover crop of about 135,000 tons and a 2022 crop expected to be between 750,000 tons to 780,000 tons and much larger than the 720,000-ton crop forecast last September.
If there are too many walnuts, the same appears to apply to almonds – the state’s most valuable crop. With new orchards coming online year after year the price per pound continues to drop. In 2014 almonds fetched $4/lb. That price fell to$1.71 in 2020 and stands around $1.10 today.
February is that time each winter you can drive around the Valley and see what trees are being pushed over as farmers reassess the market.
California Farm Bureau supplied much of this story