Giving Compass' Take:

• Katherine Martinko at TreeHugger reports on an unfortunate bacterium that is ravaging citrus groves in Florida and preventing fruits from ripening. 

• Many people are not even aware that citrus is facing a struggle, how can funders help shine a light on this matter? 

• Here's an article on building a platform in Florida to drive food policy change. 

Bananas aren't the only popular fruit facing a doomsday scenario. The Florida citrus industry is in a steep and scary decline, due to a lethal disease that is decimating the state's biggest crop. The Washington Post reports that a bacterium called huang long bing (HLB) has infected 90 percent of Florida's citrus groves. HLB originates in China, as did citrus, and is believed to have come to Florida in smuggled tree clippings in 2005. The effect has been devastating:

"The pathogen prevents raw green fruit from ripening, a symptom called citrus greening. Even when the fruit does ripen, it sometimes drops to the ground before it can be picked. Under Florida law, citrus that falls from a tree untouched cannot be sold."

It's worsened by the presence of citrus psyllids, tiny insects that spread HLB from leaf to leaf. Climate change will enable the citrus psyllid to move further north out of Florida.

The harvest season typically runs from November till May, but thousands of growers have walked out of the groves because they see no point in continuing. The problem has been a long time coming. As the Post states, "More than 7,000 farmers grew citrus in 2004; since then, nearly 5,000 have dropped out." Packing operations and juice-processing facilities have shrunk to a fraction of their previous numbers, and 34,000 jobs were lost between 2006 and 2016.

Read the full article about saving Florida's citrus trees by Katherine Martinko at TreeHugger.