Westfalia Fruit Peru's fresh avocado shipments grew by 25% in the 2022 campaign, increasing to 50,000 tons. This increase was achieved despite the difficulties faced by the entire Peruvian industry because of the effects of the war between Russia and Ukraine, the exchange rate of the euro with the dollar, the increase in the cost of shipping freights, and the longer-than-usual transit times to Asia, stated Omar Diaz Marchena, the general manager of Westfalia Fruit Peru.
In addition, the avocado season in Spain, Israel, and Morocco ended later than expected increasing the volume of fruit in the market, mainly in Europe.
However, the company managed to increase exports by following a market diversification plan. "We export avocados to very distant markets. One of our main destinations is Asia, where we ship them to Japan, China, South Korea, and Thailand. We plan to continue growing in these markets, as in the United States, and perhaps reduce our shipments to Europe a little to have a more equitable market diversification," he added.
Regarding the 2023 campaign, he said it was still too early to know how much avocado they would ship, as the flowering and fruit curdling periods are just ending. However, exports are expected to grow by 10%.
IQF avocado
Omar Diaz highlighted that they also exported frozen avocado (known as IQF), a business unit that was created to provide added value for category 3 fruit and complete or integral service for the producers that work with them.
This business unit was decisive this year because the fruit for the national market (category 3) had very low prices, however, the company was able to buy that fruit from producers at fairer prices and refer it to its frozen channel, he stressed.
Source: agraria.pe