As EastFruit reported a few days ago, despite global apple deficit, exports of these fruits from Moldova remained critically low even before Russia introduced its complete ban on Moldovan produce imports. Consequently, apple prices in this country remain rather low although there has been a recent uptrend, giving some hope to growers.
The main question remains whether the stocks of apples are too high, and growers will be able to sell all of the apples at a reasonable price until the end of the season.
According to experts from fruit associations in Moldova, about 135-140 thousand tons of apples from the 2023 harvest will remain in the fruit storages of local gardeners and traders by the end of the year, which is significantly less than earlier expectations. This is good news for the market as in normal seasons Moldova exports up to 150-170 thousand tons of apples from January through July.
However, in 2020/21, when exporters from Moldova periodically faced problems with apple exports to the Russian market, in the spring up to 40 thousand tons of apples were send to processing into apple juice concentrate (AJC) at a major loss to growers.
In the current season, direct exports to the Russian market are impossible although re-exports are likely to continue via Kazakhstan and Belarus. However, luckily, demand for AJC is high and prices for industrial apples are much higher than in 2020/21. Therefore, risks are lower in the current season.
According to local fruit growers’ associations, apples in the fruit storage of Moldova are mostly high-quality, which could meet requirements of the demanding buyers in the countries of the Middle East, EU, South-East Asia or India. Therefore, they expect apple prices in Moldova to remain strong though the end of the current season.
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