The overseas fruit export season has finished and the final results speak volumes. According to statistics provided by Patagonia Norte, during the first semester of the year Argentinian vessels shipped around 283,000 tonnes. This shows a 31% fall in sales in comparison with consolidated data from the same period of the previous season and it is the lowest in fifteen years of overseas exports.
In absolute values, during 2012 around 126,000 tonnes of fruit were no longer exported, which is no minor issue, as that represents a value of around 120 million dollars which the region will no longer receive from the exports leaving San Antonio and Bahía Blanca. Taking also into account the pear and apple exports leaving Buenos Aires, losses amount to 140 million dollars.
These millions of dollars in losses will bring negative effects to the payment chain during the second semester of the year, as well as to the demand for workers and the budget of companies which incurred additional debts to be able to face their commercial commitments.
Since the end of last year, regional entrepreneurs anticipated problems with fruit sales to the Old Continent, and that's why they redirected their exportable offer.
Despite this, and for the third season in a row, the biggest regional exporters will suffer the greatest losses this year, because most of their produce will end up being sold in Europe -with not much redirected- since they cannot avoid their commitments with the importers.
Foreseeing this scenario, the small and medium firms of the region, which have plenty of room to redirect their offer, stopped working with the big exporters to be able to sell their production in the Brazilian and local markets, which is what provided them with bigger profits.
Source: Río Negro