Following the recent freeze in south Florida, Asian vegetable crops are one of the commodities that have been severely affected by those cold temperatures. "We lost pretty much everything," says Dennis Sever of Exotic Growers, Inc., noting it carries items such as Callaloo, Mong Toi, Potato Leaves, Pumpkin Leaf, Indian and Chinese bitter melon.
© Exotic Growers, Inc.
L: Gongura; R: Callaloo
It also affected, albeit to a lesser extent, crops such as the company's Thai guava crop. "The fruit that was mature and should have been picked just fell so we had to discard that fruit. It'll be about a month before or maybe a little longer before we get volume," he says, noting that while it usually ships 20-30 pallets/week, right now it's down to half of a pallet per week.
In both cases, growers did tap into the aqueducts running underneath south Florida for underground frost protection. While it helped the guava, the risk with vegetable crops is waterlogging them. In turn, while some larger growers were able to plant Asian vegetable crops right away, others may not be able to replant until the end of February.
Now, Exotic Growers is bringing in product from Mexico and Honduras, which it normally doesn't do because the company prefers to carry local product.
© Exotic Growers, Inc.
Thai guava
Variability in pricing
All of this is leaving pricing all over the board. "Imports are still priced relatively right and not that expensive. On Florida product though, the quality and consistency varies so much. Mong Toi–some people were able to tarp it but there's no major volume. Normally pricing is in the low $20s and high teens but right now it's $40/case if you can find it," Sever says.
At the same time, with Lunar New Year just ahead, demand will start increasing for Asian vegetables and that's expected to strengthen pricing.
Meanwhile, there are some other issues with demand. "February is already a slow month to begin with and Lunar New Year was one thing we had going for us," says Sever, noting that the cold temperatures throughout the U.S. have slowed demand on a number of commodities. That means that on some items, like dragon fruit, pricing had to drop due to a lack of demand.
© Exotic Growers, Inc.Bitter melon
However, there are other factors impacting commodities consumed by ethnic communities such as Latin American, Indian and Asian. "Most of my customers in Minnesota, Chicago, Detroit and others, people there are not shopping anymore because of the ICE (United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids. They're afraid they'll be detained," Sever says. "We had retailers who would take $5,000-$6,000/week orders who are now only taking $300/week on orders. It's been like this for two months and a few retailers have gone out of business."
For more information:
Dennis Sever
Exotic Growers, Inc.
Tel: +1 (305) 393-1556
[email protected]
