July 6, 2018

Oklahoma-based Raptor Ag announced late last month that it successfully raised $25 million in capital from private equity, family offices, and individual investors to fund the acquisition and development of hazelnut orchards in Oregon, reports NewsOK.

Listed as in existence on August 1, 2016 by CEO Chris Eubanks and his partner Jason Perkins, Raptor has acquired 1,000 acres on which it has already planted 200,000 hazelnut trees, with 100,000 more trees to be planted this year, and has forged long-term leases on another 600 acres of orchards.

Booming

Turkey is the dominant global hazelnut producer, accounting for 75 percent of the world’s supply, while the U.S. accounts for about 3.5 percent of global production. Of total U.S. production, 99 percent of the country’s hazelnuts are grown in the Willamette Valley in Oregon.

High prices, consumer enthusiasm, and new, heartier cultivars have resulted in greater hazelnut planting. In 2014, Oregon growers planted 4,300 acres, Mike McDaniel, principal of Pacific Agriculture Survey told Capital Press. This was followed by 6,200 acres in 2015, and 9,200 acres in 2016. As of 2017, total Oregon hazelnut acreage reached 60,600 acres – reflecting an increase of 23,500 acres in only four years, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s 2012 Agriculture Census.

“It’s an exciting time for this industry,” Lance Kirk, a third generation hazelnut grower, told Capital Press in April of this year. “We have so many new growers planting orchards and the attendance at the winter meeting told us they are looking for as much information as they can get to help them.”

After years of due diligence and market observation, Eubanks and Perkins decided  to launch a hazelnut operation in the Willamette Valley, however, they noticed that most hazelnut orchards in the region were a smaller part of operations that grew other produce such as vegetables due to the challenging entry costs ranging between $6,000 and $8,000 per acre, and the fact that it takes upwards of 12 years for a hazelnut tree to reach maturity and peak production.

Despite this, the partners are taking a long-term view of the endeavor.

“They will yield strongly for 40, 50 to 60 years,” Eubanks told NewsOK. “Those orchards will outlive all of us.”

-Lynda Kiernan