The Florida Citrus Commission met in Bonita Springs Wednesday.

The group approved a budget for the upcoming fiscal year, while citrus crops in the state face an uncertain future.

Florida’s multi-billion dollar citrus industry has taken a beating recently.

Citrus greening –a bacterial disease that’s hard to detect – has spread to all 32 orange producing counties in the state.

While the greening wasn’t a topic of discussion at the Florida Citrus Commission’s public meeting, the uncertainty of the crop was.

Doug Ackerman, the Executive Director of the Florida Department of Citrus, said erratic weather patterns created an unprecedented drop in the number of citrus producing trees, which makes the department’s future finances hard to predict.

“A lot of the budget conversations that we had were kind of what if,” he said. “There is a lot of uncertainty in trying to predict – especially this early out—where we are going to end up, but we have to make certain marketing decisions like buying media and those kinds of things that we have to kind of put a best-guess budget forward.”

Ackerman said his department should have a better idea of what citrus crop yields are going to be in the next fiscal year by October.

The commission adjusted its marketing budget in anticipation of fewer boxes of oranges and grapefruits coming out of Florida’s trees.

Another factor affecting the citrus budget is the federal sequestration.

Ackerman said cuts to a USDA program that helps market Florida citrus overseas, will definitely affect the commission’s finances.

“It’s matching marketing dollars, in some cases dollar- for dollar, for what we do overseas,” Ackerman explained. “So, it’s a significant – we feel the pain when we miss those dollars.”

Another focus was on how to market orange juice to people younger than 40 years old, which is a growing and competitive market in the beverage industry.