The latest issue of Southwest Farm Press arrived in the mail today and a couple of articles caught my attention.
They concern the 2021 chile crop.
New Mexico chile is a big industry in the state and it is important culturally as well.
There is currently a drought in the state and farmers are hoping for a good spring rain to break it. Along with rain, farmers face labor issues and COVID-19 didn't help matters last year as some chile crops had to rot in the fields due to lack of labor to harvest it.
One article stated that in 1992, New Mexico farmers harvested 34,000 acres of chile peppers annually. By 2014, that dropped to 8,000 to 9,000. But, that has seemed to stabilize now.
Much of the decline stemmed from competition from Mexico, where increased acreage increased from 8,000 to more than 80,000. Mexico can grow and sell chile cheaper than in New Mexico.
Processing red chile is not time sensitive as green chile. Green chile has to move fast.
Along with water and labor concerns, regulations are a concern for the New Mexico chile industry. A lot of mom & pop operations have gone out-of-business because of regulations. (And we know which political party is fond of regulations, don't we?) Unfortunately, people who pass and enforce regulations don't understand the the "complexity of agriculture." More officials with backgrounds in agriculture need to be elected. Farmers in Mexico have fewer regulations to hamstring them.
So far, the rain situation is worse than in 2020. Unless it changes, there will be problems for the chile industry.
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