According to producers, Costa Rica's pineapple bonanza is facing a series of issues which threaten its stability in this second semester of the year, such as the fall in prices, overproduction, competition for the strengthening of the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Mexico, and Colombia in the world fruit market, and the disappointing results of the placements to China.
The uncertainty caused by these factors was confirmed in separate statements by the president of the National Chamber of Producers and Exporters of Pineapple (Canapep), Abel Chaves; the president of the National Chamber of Agriculture and Agroindustry (CNAA), Juan Rafael Lizano, and Christian Herrera, a producer from the north zone.
Even though the pineapple sector had a remarkable growth in the first six months of the year, the blow, they said, will be felt in the second half of the year. Herrera said that the recovery, if there is one, will take at least a year and a half, while Chaves said that, quite possibly, there will be a decline in the export figures of this fruit in 2018, and that in 2019 the country would only aspire to maintain the levels of 2018.
Meanwhile, Lizano, warned that the overall performance of Costa Rica's agricultural production in 2018 would be seriously affected by the situation of the pineapple sector.
The situation is worrisome and it is forcing Costa Rica and its pineapple producers to look for alternative markets to place their fruit, including New Zealand (which sent a delegation of technicians to Costa Rica last week), Japan, Israel, and Peru, explained Chaves. Costa Rica still has to meet all of these market's access requirements, which are still in process.
The pineapple is Costa Rica's second export product, only behind bananas. Last year, pineapple exports amounted to $940.7 million, while banana exports amounted to $1.039 billion, and the export of devices for medical use, which ranked third by income, amounted to $ 770 million, according data of the statistical yearbook of the Foreign Trade Promoter (Procomer).
Costa Rica currently has some 44,000 hectares of pineapples in 16 cantons of the Huetar Norte, Huetar Caribe, and South Pacific regions. The factors that threaten the pineapple's stability, include temporary issues and structural issues, said Chaves.
One of them is that between 2015 and 2017 the climate affected the plantations of the Philippines and Thailand, which lowered the supply of fruit, particularly for juices and concentrates. This situation raised the prices of this type of fruit to $0.28 and $0.32 per kilo. However, when that area's condition normalized at the end of 2017, the offer increased and prices fell to $0.03 and $0.04 per kilo.
In that period, a lot of fruit that was initially destined for consumption in fresh was diverted to the juice and concentrates industry.
In addition, each year producers face a phenomenon between June and August that is called natural flowering, where production levels can not be controlled and, consequently, supply increases. This period is becoming longer this year.
Those two factors, which can be considered temporary, have affected the current supply and led to an oversupply. Hence, the price of a 12-kilo box of fresh pineapple fell from an average of $12 at the beginning of this year to $4 and $5 at the moment, according to data provided by Canapep.
The pineapple sector had great expectations about the opening of the Chinese market, which was achieved in 2017. However, the difficulty of the trip is practically taking Costa Rica out of the market, as it takes 28 to 30 days for the fruit to arrive to China, and, according to estimates, the fruit starts losing quality after 20 days, stated Herrera and Chaves.
According to Canapep, in 2017 the country exported a total of 6,100 tons of fresh product to China. Between January and May of this year, Costa Rica has only placed 291 tons in that market.
Herrera added that this situation can be resolved, as the sector is working with Procomer and the Ministry of Foreign Trade (Comex) to get a shipping company to transport the fruit between Caldera and Shanghai in about 19 days. However, Herrera warned, a shipping company needs to export at least 150 containers (about 25,000 kilos each) per week for the service to be profitable.
In addition, Mexico and Colombia are becoming important in the pineapple market, one on the west coast of the United States and the other in Europe, the best markets for Costa Rica's fruit. These two countries offer the golden or Gold variety that Costa Rica sells, because they imported the seed from here, Chaves said.
The markets of New Zealand, Japan, Israel and Peru could be an interesting possibility, due to the competition there is in Europe, the United States and Asia, Canapep said. However, they haven't been opened up yet.
Source: nacion.com