The transition of organic vegetable production from desert regions in the Southwest to Coastal California is well under way, resulting in a demand-exceeds-supply situation for many commodities. The switching of production areas is being accompanied by strong spot market FOB prices—with the expectation that it will be at least several weeks before supplies of most commodities reach equilibrium with demand.

Casey Mills, director of commodity management at Salinas, California-based Braga Fresh Family Farms, said the “transition from the desert growing region up to the Salinas Valley is in full swing. We have already commenced harvest on numerous crops up north including organic cauliflower, organic broccoli, organic leaf lettuce, and organic romaine hearts.”

Casey Mills, Director of Commodity Management, Braga Fresh Family Farms

In fact, Mills noted that Braga Fresh will have switched all customers to load out of its Salinas Valley facilities by April 1. While some production will remain in the desert for several weeks, Braga Fresh will be transferring products as needed from the desert growing region to Salinas. Mills said this will allow the company’s customer base to load Braga’s full array of organic commodities, along with its line of value-added items, in one consolidated location.

“At this time, we do not see any major gaps in production, although quality issues toward the tail end of the desert and slow starts in Salinas have created strong demand-exceeds markets on the organic romaine, organic leaf, and now organic celery,” he said.

Gabe Romero, a salesperson at The Nunes Company in Salinas, agreed that over the next three weeks, until mid-April, organic supplies will be tight on several commodities, especially iceberg lettuce, romaine, and other leaf lettuces. This week, supplies of organic iceberg lettuce were so short that Nunes did not have its Foxy Organic brand iceberg lettuce on its sales sheet. “But the FOB price in Yuma on 24s has reached $40 to $50 (on the spot market) over the past 10 days," Romero noted.

Gabe Romero, Sales, The Nunes Company

The Yuma harvest, he said, on the organic commodities is winding down quickly “as celery will be our only item harvested in the desert after early next week. Overall supplies across all items are very limited, with markets rising and demand exceeding supply on most commodities.”

Nunes will continue to ship organic celery from the desert through April before transitioning to Oxnard. However, Romero said blight remains a major issue, and yields will be lower than anticipated, with a high percentage of hearts versus stalks for the next two weeks.

Going through a list of the company’s top organic items, Romero singled out broccoli as one commodity that should see decent supplies and good quality through the transition. 

While this year’s spring transition is yielding some rising markets, Romero said the situation is proceeding normally and much better than a year ago. During the late winter months last year, the Salinas Valley was hit with some major storms, which disrupted planting schedules and caused supply gaps throughout the spring. The Nunes representative said this year there were some significant rainy days, but overall planting schedules have been followed. 

Romero added that there is not much of an overlap between production in the winter desert fields and spring production in Coastal California this season. While the current supply shortages might not be ideal, he said it is a much better situation than an overlap, which typically causes a supply-exceeds-demand market.

“At this time, we do not see any major gaps in production, although quality issues toward the tail end of the desert and slow starts in Salinas have created strong demand-exceeds markets on the organic romaine, organic leaf, and now organic celery." - Casey Mills

As crop production has changed over the years because of the dominance of contract business, most growers are planting acreage to match the business they have rather than trying to speculate with unsold acreage.