BAKU, Azerbaijan, May 8
By Klavdiya Romakayeva - Trend:
In recent years, Uzbekistan has been reducing the export of sweet cherries by an average of 26 percent, or about 7,000 tons per year, Trend reports referring to Uzbek media.
According to the information, if in 2020, by the beginning of May, Uzbek cherries were already actively sold in Russia, and they began to export from the end of April, then this year, as of May 7, there is no high activity in the export of sweet cherries from Uzbekistan. Moreover, those insignificant batches of cherries that are now being collected are sold at a much higher price than at the same time a year earlier.
“This means that the first wholesale consignments of Uzbek cherries will begin to enter the markets and supermarkets of Russia in large quantities only by mid-May 2021 - on average, two weeks later than usual,” the message said.
It is reported that early cherries appeared at the Kuilyuk wholesale market in Tashkent only at the end of April 2021, and prices for large cherries by local standards (26+ millimeters) reached $25 per kilogram.
For comparison, a year earlier, sweet cherries were already on sale at $6-7 per kilogram almost two weeks earlier. The first cherry in Uzbekistan this year cost an average of five times more than in 2020.
Thus, as of May 6, volumes of smaller cherries (up to 26 millimeters) were available in wholesale markets at prices ranging from $1.8 to $3.7 per kilogram, with an average price of $2.85, which is 31 percent higher than during the same period in 2020.
Also, against the background of the rapid growth of the world market for cherries, Uzbekistan in recent years has been reducing the export of sweet cherries by an average of 26 percent, or about 7,000 tons per year. It looks like 2021 will be no exception and export volumes will decline again.
According to the economist in the investment department of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Andriy Yarmak, this reduction speaks of an urgent need for Uzbekistan to reconsider approaches to the cultivation of cherries.
It was also noted that in addition to the loss of cherry harvest, frosts and strong temperature changes are likely to negatively affect the quality of these fruits in 2021.
“A shift in the supply of Uzbek cherries to foreign markets at a later date leads to a decrease in export earnings, because competitors, primarily Iran and Turkey, are actively supplying products at this time,” experts noted.
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