Warm winter forces Spanish berries producers to overtake season

14/03/2016

With the season of berries beginning in the Northern Hemisphere, special interest has awakened to know the performance of the market after an exceptionally warm winter in Spain.

Portalfruticola.com spoke with Carlos Esteve, commercial director of Onubafruit, who took stock of how the situation is for Spanish producers, revealing a forced start of the campaign and the migration of farmers to other fruits.

Esteve points out regarding the lawsuit that “it is behaving normally. The biggest change compared to previous years is that with the climate we have had, with a very mild winter and in which there has been practically no cold, the production of berries - raspberries, blueberries, blackberries and strawberries - has been advanced in 3 or 4 weeks ”, adding that the main characteristic is that demand has had to be forced at the beginning of the campaign, "Which was not used to buying berries so early in the year".

The commercial director of the European leader in berry exports indicates that regarding prices this situation "Week to week, compared to last year's prices, they have all been below because the volume has been much higher".

To this he adds that "The first weeks have been a little more complicated for having to force the demand, but now the demand looks good. The average prices are lower but the accumulated production is higher ".

Regarding investments in new plantations, Esteve points out that "In general we are increasing in turnover of the order of 15 million euros, based on higher new productions. In the coming years there are projects to continue increasing production in almost all production lines ".

Production diversification

Esteve also spoke about the growing trend of migration to the persimmon and pomegranates by farmers, who see better opportunities in them than in citrus fruits and pits.

"We continue to have plans to continue increasing the surface area of berries and other products that we also produce, such as persimmons and pomegranates, which are also products that we are planting new plantations", he says.

"The pomegranate is a new product. We have farmers who have an interest in diversifying their crops, and the pomegranate can fit quite well into a part of the market. It is an option for farmers who want a change in products that have gone down "says Esteve.

Esteve points out citrus and stone have been down or stagnant.

"There are people who are taking out citrus fruits and putting a pomegranate, because it's a bit of renovation. There are some who have chosen to renew with the same fruit, but others have changed completely. The pomegranate and the persimmon have attracted interest ", concludes.

Source: Fruit Portal