Florida’s crops devastated by Hurricane Ian 

Since Hurricane Ian struck southwest Florida on September 28, reports have been emerging of the vast damage to the state’s agriculture, with much field crop planting just beginning. Christa Court, economist and director of the Economic Impact Analysis Program for the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS), said: “Hurricane Ian’s arrival coincides with the usual timeframe for plantings of most crops in the region. The crops in harvest now include avocado, oranges, grapefruit, carambola, corn, peanuts, and sweet potatoes.” 

On October 3, WFSU reported online, “As they begin to assess groves damaged by Hurricane Ian, Southwest Florida citrus growers are seeing conditions potentially worse than after Hurricane Irma, which played a key role in citrus production falling by more than one-third in 2017.”