Over spring break, every form of social media blew up when Chipotle said in their annual report stated that an avocado shortage and rising guacamole prices could lead them to take guacamole off of their menu. But is this something guacamole lovers need to seriously worry about?
Even though a Chipotle report brought the guac-pocalypse to the attention of the public, a Chipotle spokesman told NBC’s Today Show that the avocado shortage is, “a non-issue… the sky is not falling.” Chipotle uses 50 tons of avocados a day to make their delicious guac, and, according to the spokesman, they’ll find those 50 tons no matter what happens with the avocado industry.
This year a smaller portion of the 50 tons will come from California, a large avocado-producing area. According to a Men’s Journal article, California avocado production is projected to drop to 300 million tons this year, down from 500 million last year, although some of that can be attributed to normal “crop cycling.”
A drought in California this year has also played a hand in decimating the avocado crop. Restaurants have had to import a greater portion of their avocados from outside of the US. Some of the added costs of importing could be passed onto the consumer, making it more expensive to add guac to a Chipotle dish.
Right now there may be a small variance in avocado prices, but next year prices could easily be back down to normal. Guacamole lovers have no reason to worry right now. However, in the long term there is reason to worry that avocado could become rarer on menus, as scientists are predicting a drop of 40% in California avocado production over the next thirty years as global temperatures rise. If we didn’t have reason to cut down on CO2 emissions and slow down global warming, now we do.
Stop global warming, or the guac-pocalypse will actually be a real thing.