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USDA reinstates August apple production forecast
Bowing to industry pleas, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has reinstated the August apple production forecast, industry and government sources said March 9.
?We?re very happy that the USDA has agreed to put it back,? said Mark Gedris, director of membership and communication for the Vienna, Va.-based U.S. Apple Association.
Traditionally issuing both an August and October apple crop estimate, the USDA announced late in 2011 it was planning to eliminate the August apple crop estimate for apples in an effort to cut costs. That prompted an outcry from apple growers and shippers, who use the August report to set expectations for the season.
The USDA?s National Agricultural Statistics Service decided to restore the August crop estimate after apple industry members told the USDA it was more valuable than the October apple estimate, said Alex Minchenkov, spokesman for the USDA.
?The August report will be released instead of the October (crop forecast),? Minchenkov said.
Gedris said U.S. Apple Association president Nancy Foster had been involved with talks with the agency through late February to restore the August report.
?The loss of this data would have harmed the U.S. apple industry,? Foster said in a March 9 news release from U.S. Apple.
While the industry has not received formal notification that the October report was cut, Gedris said that U.S. Apple members definitely felt the August was the most valuable of the two forecasts.
?If they had to choose one, we definitely want the August report,? Gedris said.
NASS said in a news release it will contact apple producers from late July to early August to gather information about the 2012 apple crop. The crop production estimate will be published Aug. 10, according to the USDA.
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