Reasons abound for harsh summer fruit market conditions

The weather is wonderful, but this is not always good for trade. Other factors also provide decreased fruit and vegetable sales. "We have periods of leave, ramadan and an abundance of trade," says Cedric Geens van W. Jonckheere from Brussels. "Between July 14th and the 21st (every year) it is very quiet, maybe even a little more extreme this year. The World Cup also had a negative effect on our sector, and on the entire Belgian economy. Society's consumption totally changes during events like this."

Big volumes, low prices
At the moment there is a lot of summer fruit on the market. "The prices are dramatic. Take stonefruit for example: production in Spain is a lot higher than it was last year. Therefore it is striking that nectarine consumption is lower this season. With peaches it is always like this, and the reason for this is the increasing production of paraguayo peaches. We still do not know the reason for the lower nectarine consumption. According to Cedric a lot of prices are halved. Last year they were taking in 8/9 Euro for paraguayo's with the size double a. Now they are only making 5 Euro. Plums were being sold last season for 14 Euro per 10 kilos, now they are only getting 7/8 Euro per 10 kilos. The whole sector is on it's last legs."

Enough substitutes
According to Cedric, another reason for the stagnant prices is the large supply of oversees fruit. "If you see what is available from the oversees fruits (apples, pears, grapefruit) you can see there is an oversupply. Even if there is less supply of a certain product, it still does not go well. An example is the production decline of melons due to hailstorms in Spain. Miracle prices did not occur here. That just goes to show that this is a difficult market. There are enough substitutes available. If something becomes a little more expensive, customers will just choose something else." This week there was less supply of Charentais melons, but Jonckheere expects that next week new melons will be in from France.

Cedric is not counting on any improvement until mid-August. "July 21st is a national holiday so we will have a shorter week. After that more people will be going on vacation." Importer Jonckheere has worked for years in the same manner and they are still satisfied. "We are trying our best, we consciously do not work too much with big warehouses because the pressure there is too high. On top of this we also do not believe in working with entities that are too large. We love the charm of a SME and we focus mostly on the Belgian gross services and market services."

For more information:
Cedric Geens
W. Jonckheere SPRL
Werkhuizenkaai 112
1000 Brussel
Tel: +32 - 22426103
Fax: +32 - 22451079