Working Toward Better Orange Juice in the HLB World

Abstract

It’s no secret that HLB has challenged our juice industry to maintain the outstanding quality associated with Florida orange juice.  Moreover, increased prices and competition from new juice products and blends have reduced Florida orange juice consumption.  We believe that improving the quality, especially flavor and color, of our juice products, can help turn the situation around. The UF/CREC citrus improvement team has been engaged in sweet orange improvement since the mid-1980’s.   Because the complex biology of sweet orange makes it difficult to directly breed new sweet oranges, our program has exploited other reliable sources of genetic variation, in addition to conventional breeding.  Last year our group published an article in Citrus Industry describing how HLB-tolerant mandarin hybrids we are developing could be used to improve Florida orange juice (http://citrusindustry.net/2018/09/17/could-hlb-tolerant-mandarins-be-used-in-florida-orange-juice/). That article focused on research to gain a better understanding of the genetics that control fruit flavors, using sensory analyses (taste tests) to decipher flavor perception.  Here, we provide an overview of our progress and strategies regarding the development of true processing sweet oranges with potential to enhance the Florida NFC portfolio, as well as the development of sweet orange-like hybrids that could be used to enhance Florida juice quality, or to produce new high quality stand-alone juice products.