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Cherry Losses Put at $38.5 Million in San Joaquin County

Posted on: Sunday, 11 September 2005, 15:00 CDT

Sep. 10--STOCKTON -- San Joaquin County cherry growers may receive some relief from Washington in the form of low-interest loans now that area farm officials have declared the past spring's crop -- hammered by $38.5 million in losses because of rain -- a disaster.

Scott Hudson, county agricultural commissioner reached that conclusion, estimating the overall loss averaged 0.83 tons, or 1,660 pounds, on each of the area's 16,200 acres of cherry orchards. That's nearly 40 percent below the county's average production for the past five years.

He requested a formal disaster declaration through the Governor's Office of Emergency Services, which forwarded the request to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Any sort of relief for the crop losses would come from federal officials, Hudson said Friday.

"We're the ones that make the call on whether there's a problem. They're the ones that resolve it," he said.

Jeff Torres, executive director of the USDA's Farm Service Agency office in Stockton, reported Friday he was still waiting to receive word from his higher ups.

Should that come through, Torres said affected cherry grower would probably be offered low-cost emergency loans to cover their losses.

"That's probably right now what we'd offer right off the bat," he said.

Growers would qualify for such loans, however, only if they are unable to borrow money from commercial agricultural lenders. The agency's direct emergency-loan program allows farmers to borrow up to the amount of their loss up to $500,000 over one to seven years at 3.75 percent interest.

Cherries are a leading cash crop in San Joaquin County, which accounts for about60 percent of cherry production in California. The value of the 2004 crop was pegged at nearly $98 million.

The fruit, as it approaches full ripeness, is susceptible to damage from late rains. The moisture causes the cherries to swell, and the tender skins split, rendering them worthless. It can also foster fungus and rot.

Statewide, California cherry growers lost perhaps half the total crop to rain this year, said Jim Culbertson, executive manager of the California Cherry Advisory Board in Lodi.

Still, those farmers shipped more than 3.2 million 18-pound boxes of cherries to market this year.

"We've had worse," Culbertson said Friday. Much greater weather losses were suffered in 1998, when statewide production fell short of 900,000 boxes.

At the same time, he noted, crop damage varied from region to region or even orchard to orchard, depending on when and where the rains came. Many growers saw their cherry crops wiped out.

"It's probably a little bit of a situation of the haves and have-nots," Culbertson said. "Based on timing and crop ripening within the district, earlier guys were maybe more affected by the rains and have some real horror stories to tell about their situations."

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Source: The Record

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