LAKELAND, Fla.—Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on July 17 announced that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has changed its regulations on the required sugar content for pasteurized orange juice.
The move is intended to help Florida’s languishing orange industry, which has declined by 95 percent in nearly 30 years due to hurricanes and an explosive multi-decade outbreak of huanglongbing, or citrus greening disease, caused by the invasive Asian citrus psyllid.
Citrus greening starves orange trees of nutrients, killing roots while reducing the sugar content in the few fruit that survive the systemic infection.
Four years ago, the popular Florida’s Natural orange juice company—which had until then touted its formula for containing 100 percent Florida oranges—announced it would begin using a blend of fruit from the United States, Brazil, and Mexico after the Sunshine State’s citrus industry free fall….