Ukrainian growers have started selling early varieties of apples this week, analysts of the EastFruit project report. “Geneva” apples are the main offer on the market today. It is notable that this year the growers started harvesting almost 10 days later compared to last season, which is caused by the later ripening due to unfavorable weather conditions.
The prices for the first lots of early apples of the “Geneva” variety were at the level of UAH 15-25/kg ($ 0.55-0.92/kg), which corresponds to the price level for the first lots last year.
According to farmers, the activity of wholesale buyers is still quite low, since early apples are available on the market only in small volumes now. Their supply will be larger in the next 2 weeks.
Another problem for apple producers in the current season is unfavorable weather conditions. Most growers reported that a very high percentage of losses were among early and summer apple varieties damaged by hail. This will affect both the yield and the quality of apples. Some growers, due to very low quality characteristics of early apples, will have to send almost the entire harvest for processing, since hail apples are in a non-marketable state and cannot be sold on the fresh market.
At the same time, the majority of Ukrainian growers hope that demand in this segment will increase when more expensive autumn varieties of apples, suitable for storage, begin to go on the market.
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