The fruit and vegetable trade balance in the first 7 months of 2020 
did not differ from the trend of the first half of the year. There was growth in value (+6.7% over 164 million more) while volumes dropped by 4.7%. The quantities exported are decreasing but prices are increasing. The total export value exceeds 2.6 billion euro, according to ISTAT data, provided by Fruitimprese.
On the other hand, imports are stable in terms of volume (+0.6%) but are growing in value (+3.4%). The imported quantities (2.2 million tons) once again exceeded the exported quantities (1.9 million tons), while the value of exports exceeded the imports by about 68 million euro. The trade balance for the first seven months of 2019 remains positive (+3.4%).
Volumes were negative both for fresh fruit (-7.3%) and dried fruit (-10.5%), citrus fruits recovered slightly (+1.9%). In terms of value, a positive trend was recorded for all categories, a +21.3% for citrus fruit, a +13.7% for dried fruit, and a +6.4% for legumes.
The numbers for the imports show that Italy purchased over 2.2 million tons of fruit and vegetables for a value of over 2.5 billion euro. In terms of value, citrus fruit imports grew strongly (+50.6%), fresh fruit increased by +8.4%, leguminous vegetables decreased (-15.7%). In terms of volume, there was an increase for the citrus fruit (+22.7%), dried fruit (+5.4%) and tropical fruit (+5.6%).