ADEFHCU, Uruguay’s association of deciduous fruit growers and exporters, has written off this year’s export season after the crop was virtually wiped out by a devastating hail storm in January.
Grisel Moizo told Americafruit that practically the entire 6,500ha production area for apples, pears and stonefruit was affected.
“In a normal season, we’d expect the harvest to reach around 100,000 tonnes but this year output will be nowhere near that figure,” she explained.
“As a result, the export total will be insignificant – only a handful of companies have opted to ship any fruit at all and even then it is more a case of keeping commercial channels open rather than establishing significant programmes.”
Until recently, shipments have been predominantly focused on Europe, which traditionally absorbs around 80 per cent of the export crop.
However, Moizo said companies are showing a growing tendency to diversify into new export markets.
She noted that sendings to Asia and North and South America have all risen sharply in the last three years and are expected to go on doing so in the future.
However, she warned that there is some uncertainty as to the 2014 crop.
“It’s still too early to tell to what extent the buds were affected by the hail damage but we remain hopeful that production will fall the within normal range next year,” she noted.
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