Final pecan crop deliveries down for the year

The Year End Inventory Report was recently released by the American Pecan Council, who collects data on pecans grown and shipped by U.S. growers and shellers. The year-end numbers showed pecan deliveries from growers into the supply chain reached approximately 307 million pounds, down slightly from last year’s deliveries of 332 million pounds.

The last two crop seasons have seen decent production after two years of lower production due to hurricane Micheal hitting Georgia right before harvest and wiping out a significant amount of the areas production.

While U.S. pecan production is spread out across the southern U.S., South Georgia is the largest producing region in the world, and Georgia’s pecan production accounts for nearly a third of all U.S. pecan production. When catastrophic weather events happen in this region, it affects global pecan production in a major way.

Pecan shipments from the U.S. fell also, but demand is still outpacing the production capacity here in the U.S. Growers continue to plant new trees and rehabilitate older orchards and varieties, but are currently unable to meet the rising demand.

This is only expected to continue as marketing budgets for the pecan is increasing. The new American Pecan Promotion Board formation has allowed growers to assess imports, further increasing the marketing and research budgets.

Growers have just begun harvest for the season, and so far it looks like we have a good crop in the southeast. Parts of Texas have seen intense drought and will have significant losses, however, growers in the southwest are reporting a good crop as well.

This year needs a big crop to come in, as inventory levels have dropped over the past couple of years with record high shipments to buyers and lower production, the pecan inventory levels have dropped.

The pecan supply chain has been able to keep buyers with little disruption in deliveries, however, the pieces market has been very tight with supplies, and industry needs a good harvest this season to prevent further strain on supplies.

As harvest gets well underway we will garner a better view of the coming pecan harvest, and we will be able to better establish this year’s crop size. So far, quality from the southeastern region looks very good; hopefully, the quantity will also be there.

– Matthew Bailey, The Pecan Report