Florida citrus leaders outline recovery strategies as production remains well below historic levels

Florida citrus growers, industry groups and the state Department of Citrus told the Florida Senate Committee on Agriculture on an industry update that a combination of research, replanting and continued marketing will be necessary to stabilize the state’s citrus sector after decades of production decline.

Matt Joyner, executive vice president and CEO of Florida Citrus Mutual, told the committee that citrus remains central to Florida’s agricultural economy and said the industry is pursuing multiple scientific and field strategies to limit the effects of HLB — citrus greening — and to rebuild production. “Citrus is synonymous with Florida,” Joyner said. “Losing the citrus industry is not an option.”

The presentation summarized the industry’s trajectory and the state’s response: production and acreage that once numbered in the hundreds of millions of boxes and nearly a million acres have fallen dramatically; industry leaders described a multi‑pronged recovery effort anchored in research, on‑farm therapy use and replanting.

Joyner said citrus greening, first detected in Florida in 2005, combined with a string of recent storms and freezes, drove steep declines in production and acreage. He said some metrics had fallen “just over 90%” from peak production levels and that current producing acreage is a fraction of the past peak. Joyner outlined research and field approaches that industry and researchers are pursuing, including plant growth regulators to help infected trees hold fruit, protective screening and individual tree covers for young plantings, direct systemic applications of bactericides such as oxytetracycline, large‑scale screening of molecules through a USDA ARS model he called GrowFirst, and CRISPR‑based breeding approaches to speed development of tolerant or resistant trees. “We think ultimately breeding for tolerant and…the gold standard, a resistant tree is what’s going to get us into the future,” he said.

Shannon Shepp, executive director of the Florida Department of Citrus, described the department’s role in marketing, research support and grower outreach. Shepp emphasized the department’s promotion work — domestic and international — and the department’s efforts to maintain consumer demand for Florida‑sourced orange juice while production is low. “Stopping advertising to save money is like stopping your watch to save time,” Shepp told the committee, arguing that sustained demand supports Florida growers and the downstream processing and packing infrastructure.

Both presenters described the state’s efforts to accelerate planting of HLB‑tolerant or better performing varieties and to field‑test new approaches. Joyner described an expedited propagation program run through the Department of Citrus that aims to move promising varieties from breeding and research plots into nurseries and growers’ fields; he also described the Craft Foundation (an industry field‑testing entity established to evaluate and compare research outcomes in real‑world grove settings). Joyner said the Craft program initially targeted 5,000 acres and has helped put over 10,000 acres of solid‑set citrus into the ground, with total resets and new plantings approaching over 20,000 acres.

Committee members asked about the mix of existing and new growers, the availability of nursery stock and capital for replanting, and biological controls for the Asian citrus psyllid that spreads HLB. Joyner and Shepp said replanting is driven mostly by existing multigenerational growers but that smaller new entrants and investors have come into the state; they said nurseries and capital shortages limit how fast replanting can scale. On biological controls, Joyner said parasitoid wasps such as Tamarixia have been researched and used but have not measurably reduced psyllid populations across Florida’s high pest pressure environments, though they may be useful in lower‑pressure settings.

The presentations included several economic and program metrics that committee members cited in their questions: Joyner estimated more than 33,000 jobs statewide tied to the industry and an annual economic impact he placed at about $6.8 billion; Shepp gave a similar statewide impact figure of $6.9 billion and reported about 275,000 acres of grove land (her number reflects total grove acres across the state, while Joyner’s comments focused on producing/bearing acreage and historical peaks). Shepp said growers had replanted or reset roughly 3.7 million trees since 2021, across nearly 20,000 acres, and that the state has 19 registered packing houses and 18 registered processing facilities handling juice and byproducts.

The session concluded with senators and the chair thanking the presenters and indicating further oversight and potential policy work on property tax treatment, disaster relief, and other supports that affect growers’ ability to replant and retain land in citrus production.

Ending: The committee did not take any formal legislative action at the hearing. Senators signaled interest in policy measures to ease replanting and tax burdens and to preserve the industry’s nursery and processing infrastructure; staff and industry leaders said the next steps are continued research funding, grower outreach and maintaining market demand while production recovers.