By Clint Thompson
Georgia pecan producers are nearing an end to a frustrating harvest season. Yields did not match growers’ expectations. Neither did market prices. It added up to another frustrating season, says Mary Bruorton, executive director of the Georgia Pecan Growers Association (GPGA).
“We are nearing the end of it. Some growers could be done in the next week or so. Some growers will go right before Christmas,” Bruorton said. “We’re not going to have as much yield as we were expecting. It’s going to be a smaller year, unfortunately, due to scab pressure that we’ve had this season and also the drought that we just had. It affected the kernel and not filling out the kernel as much.”
Bruorton and the Georgia Pecan Growers Association were at the Georgia Farm Bureau Convention in Jekyll Island during the first weekend in December. Their goal continues to focus on promoting Georgia pecans at different events and marketing the crop internationally.
“We’re working on hard on India right now. We’re actually going to bring in some Indian chefs next year around April. We brought in about 13 buyers last December, and that went really well for us,” she said. “We’re still working on the PQ code for in-shelled pecans so we can start shipping in-shelled pecans to India. That market is growing exponentially every day.
“We’re working through domestic retail stores through our commission. We’re doing some retail promotions in our bigger grocery store chains like Publix, Kroger, Wal-Mart, Sam’s. We’re working all angles; domestic, international, just to do everything we can to increase the price for growers.”