Wednesday 21st of March Yosi Ichay (Director General of the Ministry of Agriculture & Rural Development) visited Mehadrin in the Netherlands. Together with a trade mission they received a tour of Mehadrin's cold storage of at Olympic Fruit.
Zvi Alon (Director General of The Plants Board), Itzhak Ben-David (the Ministry's Deputy Director General, Oron Ziv ( Manager of Mehadrin Holland), Thijs van den Heuvel (CEO of Olympic Food Group), Yosi Ichay (the Ministry’s Director) and Rani Bar-Ness (Director of Rani Bar-Ness)
"Europe is our main market," says Yosi Ichay. "From the total production in Israel, 25% is exported. 70% of that goes to the European market." The importance of these markets and the change in the export in Israel are the reasons for the visit to the Netherlands. "By visiting importers and Dutch growers, we can have a look on what and how we can improve."
"We were afraid about the future for the export after the collapse of Agrexco," explains Yosi," but we realise that Israeli growers and exporters can fill the gap." After the liquidation of Agrexco many existing and new exporters took over the export of the Israeli products.
"At the moment we see many movements within the market shares of the Israeli exporters due to the circumstances of the past year. It can take another 2 years before everything is settled back again, but in the mean time I believe that there is a new leader, which is: Mehadrin", says Itzhak Ben-David (the Ministry’s Deputy Director General). "Of course I hope and see other companies getting involved in the export of Israeli products, but I see Mehadrin as the biggest exporter."
For more information:
Oron Ziv
Mehadrin
Tel: +31 180 642 570
Fax: +31 180 642 571
[email protected]