As Hatch chiles ripen and harvest moves into full swing across New Mexico, the state's famed green chile industry is struggling to keep its head above water as 21st Century challenges threaten to push the industry into further decline.
According to USDA-NASS figures, the state's chile industry last year reached a 43-year low in overall chile production, and prospects for recovery balance on a thin line of developments that could send the industry either up or down, which in turn could be the deciding factor on whether or not there will be a next generation of chile growers to produce its annual spicy crop.
Water for irrigation, foreign and domestic competition and an ever-growing challenge to get declining acres of the state's chile crop harvested before it spoils pose a deadly trio of problems the industry is facing in modern times.
Until last year, five years of drought were wreaking havoc on the availability of irrigation water for chile producers, but El Niño-driven rains provided adequate water beginning in late 2014 and into this year to allay those worries, at least for the immediate future.
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The state launched a campaign to better market locally grown chile to consumers both in and out of state last year, and those efforts have met with some early success, helping the state's chile growers to compete with foreign-grown chile producers and new domestic competition from Arizona, Texas and Colorado.
