Avocados have quickly risen in popularity as one of the tastiest healthy alternatives out there! Some recent examples include using avocados as a substitute to mayonnaise in deviled eggs, as a sandwich topping, and the ever growing trend of avocado toast. But what isn’t discussed much is how much work goes into making avocados so readily available. Below, you can see all of the hard work that goes into the avocado harvest and packing processes to bring those yummy fruit to your plates!
Table of Contents
How are Avocados Grown?
Avocados grow on trees. One really interesting fact about avocados is that both this season and next season’s fruit grows at the same time. So, as the workers harvest the fruit, they have to sort out the larger fruit that is ready for harvest with the smaller fruit that has started to grow for next season.
In large commercial growing operations, avocado orchards are strategically planted and spaced for optimal growing.
Where are Avocados Grown in California?
The two main growing regions for avocados in California are Southern California and the Central Coast. Morro Bay, a small coastal town, has their own special designation with the avocados that they produce.
However, it is important to note that California growers are not able to supply the year-round demand throughout the state or country.
What Other Countries Grow Avocados for the California Market?
The main countries that you will see in a California supermarket, in addition to California grown, are Mexico, Peru and Chile. However, Mission Produce, who is the largest global supplier of avocados and has their packing house is featured in this post, also sources avocados from: Dominican Republic, Colombia, New Zealand, Kenya, Morocco, Israel, South Africa and Guatemala.
Commercial Avocado Production
In the world of avocado production, there are a lot of small growers that send their product to larger packinghouses. At the packinghouses, avocados are washed, stored, gassed with ethylene for ripening, etc. prior to further transport to grocery stores. The large packinghouses also have their own orchards, but not enough fruit to supply the demand.
How are Avocados Harvested?
Avocados do not ripen on the tree. They are harvested while they are unripe, meaning that they are still hard. Depending on where the fruit is positioned on the tree, harvesters either use clippers or a picking pole to harvest. At the time of harvest, there can be fruit ready for harvest all throughout the tree. There are also avocados that are growing for the next season that are growing on the tree at the same time as the avocados that are ready for harvest, so the harvesters have to search for the fruit that is ready for harvest.
How are Avocados Packed?
Mission Produce has multiple large packinghouses that handle avocados postharvest, one of which is featured below. In the video below, you will see the progression through the avocado harvest and packing process through to transport. The footage of this particular packinghouse is a treat as it just opened in 2015 (this video footage was filmed in 2016), and it is not common that we get to see a brand new packinghouse in action!
Once the avocados arrive at the packinghouse, the following steps are performed:
- Hydrocooling – The bins of harvested avocados are hydrocooled upon arrival, either at night or early in the morning. During this step, water cools down the fruit to remove any residual field heat before being taken to the cooler.
- Weighing of the Bins – After being cooled, the bins are taken to the packinghouse, where they are individually weighed and are dumped onto the packing line.
- Wash Step – The avocados receive a single-pass wash with sanitizer as they pass through different colored brushes, where each brush serves a specific purpose: the green brushes are for agitation and application, the red brushes are for water removal and the black brushes are for polishing.
- Sorting – There is an initial hand sorting step to separate out the defective fruit, including issues such as decay or sunburn, which is followed by an optical sorting step to remove any fruit that does not meet product specifications.
- Labeling – Each avocado is labeled and then is transported to the designated packing line.
- Box Formation – Depending on the customer, the avocados are tray packed, bulk packed or packed into bags. The tray packed and bulk packed avocados are packed into boxes. In this facility, there is a separate box formation room, where the boxes are formed and are transported overhead to the packing area, where there is a worker that feeds the boxes to the packing line from the overhead carrier.
- Tray Pack – For the tray packed avocados, workers fill trays with avocados, pass them down and pack them into boxes.
- Bag Pack – For the fruit packed into bags, they are mechanically packed by weight. The color of the bag is determined by the growing practices: organically grown avocados are packed into purple bags, while those conventionally grown are packed into green bags.
- Cooling – The packed pallets of avocados are then taken to the cooler until further transport.
- Transport – When a truck arrives to pick up a load of avocados, the avocados go through a quality check and the truck is inspected prior to loading the truck using a forklift.
Food Safety Considerations
For an avocado harvesting and packing operation, some of the main food safety concerns are:
- Sanitation of the harvesting tools – Tools should be cleaned and sanitized, including having a clean place to store them while the workers are on break, and the company needs to have a program in place to store the knives overnight instead of having the workers take them home with them.
- Sanitation of the harvesting bags and bins – Cleaning and sanitizing of the bags and bins needs to occur on a regular and frequent basis. In this case, they are using bags that need to be laundered (differently from how you would clean a bin or harvesting bucket).
- Testing and changing of the wash water – The avocados are exposed to water during the hydrocooling and packing process. The water needs to be frequently tested and changed when needed, based on the policy in place.
- Worker hygiene – Since the harvesters touch every avocado they harvest and the workers at the packing house hand sort and pack them individually, there is a lot of handling taking place. Whether they are using their bare hands or gloves, there needs to be a hygiene policy in place to ensure that hand washing occurs every time before they return to work, and if they are using gloves, that they are clean and/or switched out regularly. This is even more so a topic with avocados now that it is recommended that the consumer washes the exterior portion of the avocado prior to cutting into it.
There are many more items to be taken into consideration, but this is just a brief list to get you thinking about it!
Postharvest Considerations
Avocados do not ripen on the tree and are harvested hard. The most important factors that handlers deal with between packing and the avocados arriving at the store is the storage temperature and the ethylene treatment. There are set temperature storage ranges for avocados, which differ based on the specific avocado cultivar, and are important to follow to prevent any internal issues caused by too cold of temperature storage, or too quick ripening caused by too warm of temperatures. The ethylene treatment is used to help initiate the ripening process in avocados.
Answering Common Avocado Questions
How to Ripen Avocados?
Avocados do not ripen on the tree. They are treated with ethylene after being packed and that initiates ripening. At home, you can speed that process up by placing avocados with other climacteric fruit (those that ripen after harvest), whether or not that be in a bag, fruit bowl or just out on the counter.
Jim Shanley, who is the owner of Shanley Farms and a Morro Bay avocado grower, helped explain some of the fun facts and frequently asked avocado questions in the video below.
Should I Wash Avocados Before Eating Them?
The FDA recommends washing avocados with running water and a scrub brush. Although we do not eat the avocado peel, research has shown that pathogen growth is common and by washing the peel, we can help spread pathogen contamination to the interior flesh portion of the avocado that we actually consume. (You can click here to read more about how to wash different fruits and vegetables.)
Does skin color indicate avocado ripeness?
No. Ripeness is determined by the firmness of the avocado. Color differs based on the different avocado cultivars, so it should not be used to help determine ripeness.
How to pick a good avocado at the grocery store?
Read this post all about how to select, store and prepare avocados!
Why can’t I get my avocado to soften/ripen?
Some avocados will never ripen, which is due to them being picked too early. This is most common when the avocados are grown in other countries besides the United States, as their avocado maturity standards are not as strict. (You can click here to learn more about those rubbery avocados that never ripen.)
Can I eat the avocado peel?
The Puebla Avocado is one type of avocado that I know of that has an edible peel.
Featured Grower Information
Shanley Farms, based out of Morro Bay, California is the featured avocado grower. They grow Morro Bay avocados, which are unique due to their large size, which also includes a larger seed size. The avocado packing house featured is one of Mission Produce’s facility’s, based out of Oxnard, California. They are a global leader in avocados, sourced from their own growers and growers all over the world.
If you enjoyed this post, you might also be interested in reading:
Vert interesting and shows how much work/labour goes in to the operation
Thanks for the article Megan,
any guesses for why the hydrocooling process occurs either at night or early in the morning? I would think they would prefer to hydrocool the fruit as soon as it gets to the facility, in order to lower the temperature quickly. (Especially when the ambient temperature is higher).
Thanks,
Siegfried
Thank you Megan, I just started working in a produce buying office. I’m learning as I go however the rest of the team doesn’t have time to give me one on one info like this. Your article was very informative, thank you!
Exactly how do the workers know which avocados are grown organically? The avocado tells the individual worker?? Are the avocados bilingual?
What is the difference between a handler and a packer?