North Italy: Lower production of tomato for sauce
Pierluigi Ferrari, chairman of the Inter-professional organization of processing tomato, said: "Despite difficulties during the campaign, mainly drought, our goal is to continue with quality improvements".
In 2012 the cultivated area destined to processing tomato was 33,464 hectares. The Emilia-Romagna region resulted as leader in production with 22,144 ha, and raw material totalled 2,370,917 tons. Average yield per hectare was 70,85 tons, in line with yield in 2011 (71.24 tons/ha).
Sugar content of tomatoes was good during 2012, 4.85 Brix, slightly down compared to 4.94 Brix in 2011. Average waste was 4.48%, in line with 2011 data (4.32%).
Average price fall and higher costs determined a significant reduction of growers' income compared to last year.
Source: www.gazzettadiparma.it