Produce Alliance Report 4.16.2026

Posted by wistful_cottage_core@reddit | PrepperIntel | View on Reddit | 24 comments

We will continue to see “demand exceeds supply” conditions on Tomatoes this week, with Florida entering its tightest week of the freeze

event. Expect deep prorates and broader quality issues. We do not anticipate improvement for another 2-3 weeks and highly recommend flexibility with sizing and varieties, as well as scaling back portions or removing items from menus where possible. Limited availability will also persist for Color Bells, Green Bells, and Corn. Hot Peppers remain in very tight supply across all categories. The Lime market is

extremely short and is expected to remain tight for the next 2-3 weeks.

Most of the growers are now in Salinas, as the Yuma season has come to an end. Rain and cooler weather are still in the forecast, which has slowed growth patterns. Harvesting is being affected by the rain. These factors will limit supplies. Broccoli, Cauliflower, Lettuce have very limited supplies and are the extreme trigger. Prorates should be expected. Romaine/Romaine Hearts, and Celery remain escalated due to limited supply and quality concerns. Carrots continue to face ongoing supply challenges, with full recovery not expected until May.

Artichokes, Bok Choy, and Napa remain extremely limited and escalated. Growers anticipate that the weather conditions combined with the transition will create quality and supply issues along with loading delays. Growing regions continue to experience cool mornings and nights with warm daytime temperatures, while ongoing port congestion in

Guatemala and Honduras is causing continued delays. As a result, items including Baby Carrots, Baby Zucchini, French Beans, Peas, Broccoli Florets, and Radicchio remain impacted, with no local recovery options available due to prior freeze-related supply gaps in Florida.

Strawberry supplies remain steady for now, though upcoming rainfall may create short-term production dips and continued quality variability as regions move through post-peak conditions. Blackberry volumes are building toward peak, but heat continues to pressure quality, while raspberries remain extremely tight despite strong quality and are expected to improve toward the end of April. Blueberry supply is increasing but remains uneven as regions transition, with availability expected to strengthen into May.

Citrus markets are experiencing tight supplies on smaller sizes across many varieties, including Lemons, Navels, Cara-Caras, Minneolas,

and Blood Oranges, with fruit generally trending large.

Freight: Limited trucks and record high fuel costs are putting upward pressure on rates daily. We are seeing several freight companies, including sea freight companies, invoking fuel surcharges which will impact cost inputs.

Full Report: https://producealliance.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Market-Report-4.16.26_FULL.pdf

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bikumz@reddit

Love the fact that shipping companies will always find a way to add an upcharge. When gas was low during Covid, they blamed container shortages and manpower shortages at docks for increased costs (they just don’t wanna pay for the right amount of labor). Meanwhile a lot of companies have yet to break their profit records of 2020. Probably gonna happen this year though.

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shortzr1@reddit

This is a very different market. In 2020 through 2022 there was a massive shift in consumer spending habits and a true demand-driven bull run in an environment with low trucking capacity. This time around costs are up for insurance, the truck itself, and obviously diesel but demand isn't there, it is just that conditions have sucked for 3 years and anyone who didn't have their books together has left the market. Capacity is gone and we're getting into produce season which normally kicks off the annual cycle, but like the thread mentions yields suck. Crazier yet, this Iran thing has choked off urea supplies, so crops like corn are going to be hit hard. Grocery prices are set to skyrocket come August. Carriers aren't going to be making record profits because it is all cost driven - not demand driven. Worse yet, if this dalilah's law thing passes as written, it will pull even more capacity out. If that happens AND we somehow get an actual demand-driven bull run, it will likely be worse than covid. Nucking futz.

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bikumz@reddit

The direct shipping lines pricing has nothing to do with trucking. They have separate companies and seperate profit margins for that. Their pricing is about moving freight on the sea with getting it loaded/discharged from vessels. Maybe if the shipping lines directly controlled the trucks instead of separate entities sure, but trucking really only would effect shipping lines if trucks/fuel was in such short supply they couldn’t load ships. But they loaded plenty of ships to the point they cried container shortage. Their load times could effect pricing, like how they had extremely backed up lines at US ports during Covid, if it didn’t effect every single shipping line the same. Most of the price increases we saw during that time were kinda just a product of greed. They screamed container shortage, but would have containers on docks set to be sailed back to other places empty to be filled. They just didn’t wanna pay labor to load those ships with empties. I keep stressing this as a key point of how these companies nickel and dime, while making billions and at the same time crying wolf.

As for where we are in terms of cargo movement, from just the numbers I’ve seen TEUs aren’t so far off from similar percentage losses during 2021 and 2022. Not sure if that’s good or bad, but month by month we will see.

Historically they have always had an out when raising prices for their higher performing years in terms of profit. I really don’t look for explanations for these costs. Because if things are really bad for them cost wise they shouldn’t have their highest earnings ever. Doesn’t add up. But who knows, I’m just a guy on the ground who sees things from my view not the top.

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shortzr1@reddit

Apologies - I misread "shipping companies" as a general term rather than as steam ship lines. Yeah, very different things. Teu's overall are down, so again to the point of total demand being down - it is a weird environment. Now we're dealing with geographic asymmetry with all the tariff nonsense with China and rerouting there plus this around-africa rerouting. Bet the east coast gets weird before long. I'm not as close to the ocean market and only adjacent to drayage, so that I'm less certain about vs OTR trucking.

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KateMacDonaldArts@reddit

Fuel costs are real and the upturn was completely preventable, that’s what bothers me the most.

IrishSnow23@reddit

You know, I don't have a green thumb, but seems quality is going way down on all kinds of things and it is going bad so much faster...I finally broke and decided to get supplies and start growing my own. They cut all the Food Safety peeps and started deregulating, and while quality degradation has been happening for a long time, it seems it has escalated. We are just going to have poison food and water with cut healthcare. Really think they are just trying to kill us off at this point.

DissedFunction@reddit

yeah. there seem to be little or no food safety regs that are enforced now, so I'm pretty sus about fresh produce. I'm going to assume it's sprayed with god knows what and the supposed MAHA movement is pretty much defunct on a practical level of protecting consumers.

wistful_cottage_core@reddit (OP)

I think growing your own food is an excellent endeavor and an exciting hobby! For me, the flavor of locally grown produce is the reason I grow my own.