{"id":57290,"date":"2025-08-15T17:27:54","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T21:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=57290"},"modified":"2025-08-15T17:28:00","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T21:28:00","slug":"florida-citrus-growers-could-benefit-from-proposed-orange-juice-regulation-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/08\/15\/florida-citrus-growers-could-benefit-from-proposed-orange-juice-regulation-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida citrus growers could benefit from proposed orange juice regulation change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Florida citrus growers are celebrating a proposal from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)<\/a> to change its definition of orange juice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re thrilled,\u201d said Matt Joyner, executive vice president and CEO of Florida Citrus Mutual. \u201cThis has been almost 3.5 years in the making. Very frustrating situation, but we are excited about the opportunity to see the administration move forward with this rule change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Florida Citrus Mutual is a Polk County-based organization that advocates for Florida\u2019s citrus growers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most recent data available show that Polk County is the top producer of citrus in terms of both production and acreage, according to Joyner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Federal regulation requires pasteurized orange juice to have a 10.5 Brix level, a measure of dissolved sugar content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen we look at the impacts of storms over the past decade and we see two decades of citrus greening that have impacted the Florida crop but also citrus worldwide, we know that trees have been stressed,\u201d Joyner said. \u201cTrees have been impacted. So the naturally occurring Brix or sugar levels in that fruit have decreased.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Florida growers often have to blend their juice with imported juices to meet that threshold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This month, the FDA proposed lowering the required Brix level from 10.5% to 10%. Joyner said Florida growers can achieve this ratio without altering the flavor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve done, as an industry, many taste tests, consumer taste tests, panels,\u201d Joyner said. \u201cThere is no recognition of the difference between 10.5 and 10.0 Brix.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cOur growers have faced many hardships over the past several years, from devastating storms to citrus greening, and could no longer endure the unnecessary and burdensome regulations that favored foreign growers,\u201d said Sen. Ashley Moody in a statement from her office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cCitrus growers have many more problems than the Brix standard,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Brix standard will certainly give them relief.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simpson said the state has invested $100 million to help growers replant citrus trees after devastation from storms and disease, which has cut Florida\u2019s crop by 90%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simpson said research into disease-resistant tree species has made \u201csignificant progress.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we hope is five years from now \u2014 an industry that went from 290 million boxes at its peak to maybe 12 million boxes this coming year \u2014 will maybe get back up to 50 or 60 million boxes of fruit,\u201d Simpson said. \u201cWe\u2019re very concerned about our citrus industry, but farmers will adapt, and farmers are very resilient.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The FDA will accept public comments through November 4, 2025. More information is available here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Florida citrus growers are celebrating a proposal from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to change its definition of orange juice. \u201cWe\u2019re thrilled,\u201d said Matt Joyner, executive vice president and CEO… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57291,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDhcL2Rvd25sb2FkLTEtMi53ZWJwP2ZpdD0yNjglMkMxODgmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJGbG9yaWRhIGNpdHJ1cyBncm93ZXJzIGNvdWxkIGJlbmVmaXQgZnJvbSBwcm9wb3NlZCBvcmFuZ2UganVpY2UgcmVndWxhdGlvbiBjaGFuZ2UiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJmb250IjoiIiwiYmxvZ19pZCI6MTYzMDQwNjYxfQ.SGxrswfwmY-lHCiVcPG71qNHYzjymqOCCvp3OgtHd_oMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":57291,"url":"http:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/download-1-2.webp","type":"image\/png"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[11988],"class_list":["post-57290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-florida-citrus-growers-could-benefit-from-proposed-orange-juice-regulation-change"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57290"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57292,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57290\/revisions\/57292"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}