VALENCIA growers are leaving fruit on the tree too late - risking a drop in next year's yields - because of low prices for juicing oranges.
Riverina Citrus chairman Frank Battistel said there was growing concern about spot prices as low as $50 a tonne for navel oranges deemed unsuitable for sale as fresh fruit and $150 a tonne for uncontracted valencias.
Mr Battistel said processors were taking advantage of growers, many of them desperate to recoup at least some of the costs of growing this year's crop, when they would be better off using the excess fruit as orchard mulch.
Recent studies on the impact of fruit left on trees past the optimum harvest date found significant yield reductions, of up to 50 per cent, for the following season.
Some companies claimed their price was equal to that paid overseas for frozen concentrated orange juice, but Mr Battistel said the FCOJ price had almost doubled since January last year on the back of smaller crops in the US and Brazil.
Mr Battistel said Riverina Citrus would try again to establish collective bargaining and employ a professional to negotiate a fair price for uncontracted fruit.
Growers overwhelmingly supported a proposal from the industry body last year, but a poll failed to obtain enough votes.
"Normally we wouldn't take any action," Mr Battistel said.
"(But) we know that product has a far bigger value than ($50 a tonne) to the processing industry."
Mr Battistel said he was perplexed by media reports last week of processors stockpiling pasteurised juice in cold storage for long periods.
Growers in the Riverina had embraced new juicing varieties to extend the harvest window to almost 12 months of the year.
"I don't understand why they would (store juice)," Mr Battistel said.
"Putting orange juice away to use at a later date costs them money and at the moment there's that many oranges in the paddock - we've stored the oranges on the tree for them free of charge."
But if juice kept in storage was mixed with fresh juice, Mr Battistel said it should be clearly labelled to allow consumers to decide whether or not to drink it.
National Foods corporate affairs director Geoff Lynch said the company, like most processors, used stored valencia juice ''from time to time, to manage the taste profile of our juice when valencia availability is low''.
Mr Lynch said stored valencia juice was not being used at the moment because the company was still buying contracted fruit.
''The use of aseptic orange juice actually adds to our production expense but we use it to balance fruit availability and provide consumers with a consistent, sweet product, made from Australian-grown oranges, all year,'' Mr Lynch said.
''It is important to understand that when we do produce aseptic juice, we use oranges that have been bought at contract prices.''
Mr Lynch said the company did not publicly discuss the price paid for fruit.
''But the price we are paying for uncontracted valencias is significantly higher than the equivalent price of imported concentrate when translated using the accepted industry calculation,'' he said.
''We do not specify the use of aseptic orange juice on labels because: we do not use it always and when we do the amount can vary from week-to-week; it is simply fresh juice that has been heat-treated via the normal pasteurization process - it has just been filled using a sterile, also known as aseptic, packing process; other processors do not identify it on labels; it is not reconstituted; it is not frozen; it is not boiled; it does not contain added preservatives; it is not required under the Food Code (and) only a very small percentage of our fresh juice is stored aseptically.''
Citrus Australia chief executive officer Judith Damiani last week urged people to send examples of misleading or deceptive food labels, especially on fruit juice, to her at PO Box 5091 Mildura Vic 3502.
Ms Damiani said the labels would be passed on to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission for investigation.
Fruit Juice Australia, which established a self regulatory code of practice in 1993 that ''promotes Truth in Labeling'', did not respond to requests for comment.
