A surprise freeze that ran through Mexico overnight on Thursday-Friday last week has pummelled the country’s winter vegetable crop, sparking expectations prices in the North American market will hit the roof over the next few months.
The freeze was focused on the western states of Sinaloa and Sonora, and hit temperatures as low as -3°C (26.6°F) for one to three hours on Thursday night. The cold spell was the worst in at least 55 years, according to industry group the Fresh Produce Association of the Americas.
Although growers are still assessing the damage, tomatoes, bell peppers, squash, cucumbers and asparagus are expected to be hard hit, according to various traders.
“We’re pretty sure that everything in Sonora is frozen and gone,” Jesse Driskill, operations manager for the Nogales office of produce trader Meyer LLC, told The Packer.
With Mexican asparagus production peaking around now, the damage to supplies is expected to be severe, and puts paid to grower expectations of a high-quality season.
Fruitnet.com has heard that shortly after the freeze damage became apparent, a number of Florida-based asparagus importers flew into Peru hoping to secure early crops from suppliers there.
With Peruvian production typically held off until the end of the Mexican and Californian seasons, however, it’s not clear whether any significant volumes of asparagus will be able to be brought forward.
The freeze in Mexico has also cut short hopes the country could take advantage of cold damage to vegetable crops in Florida in January.
With damage to winter vegetables all around, prices in the North American market are expected to skyrocket and stay high for the next few months.
The one groups of winners likely to come out of the situation is Mexico’s greenhouse growers, who are likely to have the only reliable volumes of produce available.
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