The French cherry campaign was rather mixed, with weather conditions that were not conducive to fruit development, impacting yields from the moment the fruit set in bloom. “First, we had bad weather during pollination, then again when the trees were blooming, which led to a lot of physiological drops, later again a series of storms hit the southwest of France when the fruit was ripe, which resulted in a significant loss of volumes,” explains Sylvie Ayet, managing director of Socaprim.
This bad weather has led to a reduction of almost 50% of the harvest this year. “We have had half of a harvest. Although we have a potential of 100 tons, we only harvested about 55 tons. The bulk of the campaign ended at the end of last week. In other words, the campaign lasted 4 weeks instead of 6. The shortage of supply nevertheless enabled the remaining 50% to be sold at a good price. “Of course, even with a good marketing campaign and good prices, not all producers were able to make up for the shortage in yield, which was really heterogeneous depending on the orchard.”
The cherry season is coming to an end, and the plum season will really get started on Monday. “We have already started slowly with small old varieties, but the volumes should increase significantly from this week onwards.”
For more information:
Sylvie Ayet
Socaprim
Sylvie.socaprim@wanadoo.fr