Good apple and pear harvest expected in the Netherlands

The Dutch apple and pear growers are expecting a good harvest of excellent quality this year. The trend of the last few years is continuing: less apples and more pears. The harvest estimate is 332 million kilos of apples and 352 million kilos of pears. Compared to last year this is a slight decrease in apples (-1%) and slightly more pears (+1%). The surface of pears is now almost 2,000 hectares larger than the apple area.

The production of apples in the Netherlands takes place on 7,400 hectares, whilst there are pear tress on almost 9,400 hectares. Every year the surface of apples shrinks by a few percent. Elstar remains the most grown apple by far, with a share of almost 40 percent in the Netherlands. This year 127 million kilos of Elstar is expected to be harvested. Due to a smaller area this is slightly less than last year. There will also be less of the varieties Jonagold (including Jonagored), Golden Delicious, Rode Boskoop and Kanzi picked in the Netherlands compared to 2015. This shows in information from GroentenFruit Huis based on group harvest estimates. As input for the estimate advice bureau Delphy does count among a large number of orchards spread across the country.

The harvest of Conference, worth over eighty percent of the Dutch pear harvest is estimated at 290 million kilos. This means an increase of 5 percent. The area has risen, but the trees are also full of Conference pears. The supply of Doyenné du Comice, the second pear variety in the Netherlands, is 11 percent lower.

The Dutch fruit sector has benefited from a high consumption of apples and pears from the start of the harvest season (September). The lights are therefore at green. The quality, the good size due to a favourable growing season and the excellent flavour invite you to take a bite from an apple or pear from the new harvest. The Russian boycott of fruit and vegetables from the EU is hitting the Dutch growers and traders of apples disproportionately and is causing persistent difficulties in sales and price formation. At the end of June GroentenFruit Huis and the Nederlandse Fruittelers Organisatie (NFO) handed the government an urgent letter with a call for market recovery and strengthening of the competitive position of the Dutch fruit sector.