Avocados have become nearly ubiquitous in American society, served in both fast-food and fine-dining restaurants as demand increases. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that avocado consumption in the U.S. has more than tripled since 2001.
The seeds for this growth are firmly anchored in Mexico.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that about 90% of all avocados consumed in the United States come from Mexico, representing an estimated $2.7 billion in imports by 2024.
Production in the USA is concentrated in California, which, according to the California Avocado Commission, accounts for around 90 percent of domestic production. The rest comes from Hawaii and Florida. But California's industry only covers a fraction of the immense demand.
“In the grand scheme of things, we’re just a tiny player,” says Mary Lu Arpaia, a subtropical horticulture specialist at the University of California, Riverside.
According to CAC, avocado production in California peaked in the early 2000s, but since then both acreage and yield have declined.
“The cost of production here in California is very, very high,” Arpaia said. “We have limited resources in terms of water availability and water quality. … Real estate is very expensive.”
The problem does not only affect avocados: agricultural production in the US as a whole is declining. The US Department of Agriculture reports that imports exceed exports for the first time in history.
“Mexico will almost always be an efficient, low-cost producer,” says Richard Sexton, professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of California, Davis.
More than 80% of Mexico's avocado exports go to the United States, and the industry continues to grow. In 2022, Jalisco became the second Mexican state to meet certain requirements allowing trade in avocados with the United States, opening up more opportunities for other farms and additional fruit flooding the market.
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