The growing interest in avocado cultivation of producers from other provinces in Spain, such as Cadiz, Huelva, Valencia, Alicante or Murcia, as well as other areas, such as the Portuguese Algarve or Sicily in Italy, is raising concerns in Malaga's tropical sector. Producers fear the loss of the province's leading role at national level, which could motivate some trading companies to move their headquarters to areas with a greater harvest. In Malaga, the avocado production has not grown for some time. The reason is the lack of guarantees in the water supply. So much so, that there are already companies and investors setting their sights on other areas where cultivation is possible and where there are no water deficits. In the Region of Valencia, the avocado acreage has gone from scarcely 150 hectares five years ago to 800 today. In the case of Portugal, there are already multinationals that have established themselves there in order to produce avocados.
At the moment, the acreage devoted to this fruit in Andalusia exceeds 9,000 hectares. Of these, 7,000 correspond to Malaga. According to the Government of Andalusia, around 69% of the current production has its origin in Malaga, and the rest is supplied by Granada. Production in recent years has amounted to around 70,000 tons.
Another issue that has been talked about at Fruit Attraction by some trading companies is the large production coming from countries such as Peru, South Africa, Israel or Morocco. "Spain also expects a good harvest (the campaign has just started). Now we just have to wait and see how Peru will distribute its production and how this will affect other producing countries. Peru has been redirecting part of its production to the Asian market for some years, but Europe remains its main destination, and it is also planting so much that forecasts point to it continuing to grow," said Sigfrido Molina, of Sigfrido Fruit.
Main market
The Assistant Director of Trópico Spain, Francisco Ramírez, has expressed a similar view. He believes that even Mexico, which is also having an overproduction and which has the United States as its main market (given the proximity), could redirect part of its harvest to Europe. For the manager of Trops, Enrique Colilles, it is necessary for Europe to start requiring more demanding certifications from other producing countries willing to enter the European market. Colilles stated that avocado consumption is growing so much in Europe that trading companies that had so far been specialized in other products are also starting to work with this fruit.
Source: diariosur.es
