E-Malt.com News article: USA: Commercial hop acreage up 3.37% but total production falls below 2019 crop

Commercial U.S. hop acreage increased another 3.73% in 2020, although total production fell below the 2019 crop by 7.29%, the Hop Growers of America said in their latest report published on January 25.

Citra®, HBC 394 widened its lead as the US hop acreage leader, while CTZ retained the #2 spot. Cascade fell to fifth place as Mosaic®, HBC 369 and Simcoe ®, YCR 14 took over the third and fourth place slots. Proprietary hop varieties now account for six of the top ten acreage slots.

Average yields in the Pacific Northwest fell to 1,770 pounds per acre due to severe weather challenges and heavy smoke cover during harvest, while most production regions outside of the PNW experienced average or better yields. Washington was hardest hit with a 12.56% yield reduction from 2019, followed by Idaho with 8.8% lower yields than last year. A severe storm on Labor Day brought sustained high winds, breaking many bines from the trellis and desiccating the ripe hop cones. Serious wildfires erupted as a result of this storm, blanketing much of the Pacific Northwest with heavy overcast skies and sending hop plants into early dormancy due to the lack of sunlight – causing dry cones that saw higher levels of shatter as harvest progressed. Varieties harvested prior to Labor Day had good quality and yields, but late harvested varieties experienced severe yield loss.

2020’s production decreased to 104.8 million pounds, which includes an estimate for farms not counted by USDA-NASS. NASS only surveys the PNW – Washington, Oregon, and Idaho – as they grow the majority of the US crop and are the modern traditional home of the US commercial hop industry. HGA’s network of contacts across the country provided estimates for acreage and yields – this year the survey calculated an estimate of 2,488 acres outside of the PNW yielding 1,000,000 pounds.

Washington production represented 71.4% of the Pacific Northwest, followed by Idaho with 16.6% and Oregon with 12%. The remaining states commercial hop production is estimated at one million pounds.

These states saw the loss of a number of small growers this year as local breweries reeled from the impacts of COVID impacts to on-premise sales, impacting demand for locally produced hops.

Since 2012 (9 years) US hop acreage has increased 106%, from 29,683 to 61,130 acres. During that period the variety balance shifted from roughly 50-50 alpha and aroma hops in 2012 to 77.8% aroma varieties in 2020. In 2020 alpha/bitter hop varieties represented 22.2% of US acreage.

Growers have faced substantial increases in the cost of production, driven by expansion of harvesting and production capacity to handle a doubling of acreage over the past 9 years, updating equipment, increased labor costs (including health care and other benefits), and inflation in the cost of production inputs. Administrative and operating costs associated with food safety, best practices compliance and other customer requirements have also increased. Lower yielding aroma varieties have a higher cost per pound to maintain a consistent gross income per acre. Additional economic impacts in 2020 resulted from COVID-related requirements for PPE, distancing workers during transport and operations, hiring additional workers to substitute for those who were sent home to quarantine if exposure was suspected, and additional staffing to accomplish worker health checks, sanitizing equipment/vehicles/tools and other surfaces. In addition, H-2A worker housing could not be utilized to its full capacity due to social distancing requirements, thereby increasing the costs for housing guest workers.


09 February, 2021