Because of an increasingly competitive U.S. market, the salvation of the Washington apple industry will be overseas markets, and the industry will need to become more export oriented than in the past, says agricultural economist Dr. Desmond O’Rourke. O’Rourke sees little promise in the domestic market, where per-capita consumption of fresh apples has been declining, even though Washington apple shipments have been on an upward trend over the past decade. Overall per-capita apple consumption (fresh and processed) has been fairly stable at around 48 pounds over the past two decades, but O’Rourke said this is because of increasing amounts of […]