Tropicana owner Naked Juice has warned that the spread of citrus greening disease, which changes the colour and taste of fruit, has led to soaring prices and a strain on the juice giant’s profits.

Naked Juice told lenders that it expects underlying profits of $322m (£241m) this year, down from the $375m (£279.8m) that it had previously forecast, The Times reported.

Over the past year, the spread of the citrus greening disease has seen orange crops in Florida destroyed, with the Tropicana owner’s production costs having risen due to difficulty in sourcing healthy fruit.

As a result of the disease, orange prices have more than doubled to heights of $6,500 (£4,800) per tonne.

Subscribe to Grocery Gazette for free

Sign up here to get the latest grocery and food news each morning

S&P Global Ratings analyst Gerald Phelan told The Times that despite Naked having sourced the majority of its oranges from Florida, it has since been forced to source more of the fruit from Brazil, where the disease has spread less due to better implementation of technology.

The Tropicana owner now uses a mix of 75% Brazilian oranges and 25% Floridian oranges.

In June, juice and smoothie brand Innocent’s chief executive Nick Canney warned that conditions such as drought, disease and extreme weather, which hit major orange producers such as in Brazil and Florida, would “move prices forward” for smoothies, impacting millions of UK consumers.

At the time he said: “Over time, it will definitely move prices forward again. You have to try and work out how to keep it affordable for people. Genuinely, we’re not profiteering from it at all. We’re just trying to work out how to price it in the right way.”