Sil Moonen of Berry Farm started the harvest of blueberries in Limburg this week. The harvest of his area 300 kilometres north in Drenthe will start on August 1st. "Last year we had a very different start, as the Spanish berry growers were still on the market with cooled and late varieties. The market was quickly under pressure. This year the seasons fit better due to the late spring."
The sales of the berries is taken care of by the grower himself. Sil's customers, besides those at home, are mainly in England, Ireland and later in the season Germany. According to the grower the harvest isn't less than in previous years. But due to the extreme heat from the previous week the kilos in the early varieties such as Duke are a bit lower. Sil says the biggest threat to the blueberry cultivation is the Suzuki fruit fly. "If there is no solution found for this, we will have a seriously big problem."
The consumption of blueberries is still booming. "An English supermarket recently showed me the sales figures from last year compared to those from 2013 and it was another increase of almost 20%. If this continues, we could plant all of Limburg," Sil laughs. "The younger generation are increasingly conscious of the health benefits of the fruit. A German customer of mine is at a music festival with thousands of visitors. I thought they only took pills at places like that, but apparently berries go down well too!"
"Other markets aren't just sitting around either. Thousands of hectares of blueberries are being planted in Peru by investors. But starting is one thing, keeping it up is another. I wonder how they get all of those pickers on the plantations," says Sil. "Poland is also a big competitor for blueberries. I went to look for myself and there's a large harvest, so we'll notice it on the market after next week."
"Other markets aren't just sitting around either. Thousands of hectares of blueberries are being planted in Peru by investors. But starting is one thing, keeping it up is another. I wonder how they get all of those pickers on the plantations," says Sil. "Poland is also a big competitor for blueberries. I went to look for myself and there's a large harvest, so we'll notice it on the market after next week."
A few years ago Sil introduced a shaker with a matching box to stimulate the sales. "I still stand by the idea, but the
packaging hasn't really been picked up by the market. But if someone starts it, it could be big. More profit could be made in the Netherlands with a larger packaging. In the Netherlands only Albert Heijn offers a packaging of 300 grams at the moment, but in Germany a 500 gram packaging is no exception. This is quadruple that of a standard Dutch packaging."
For more information:
Sil Moonen
Mortel 27
6088 AH Roggel
Tel: 0475-494727
Mob: 06-53288523
silmoonen@zonnet.nl
www.berryfarm.nl