The Eastern European region is now beyond reach for Uruguayan citrus producers as they prepare for the harvest season from early April this year. According to Marta Bentancur, from the Union of Fruit Producers and Exporters of Uruguay (UPEFRUY), they must navigate the shipping delays and increased costs carefully to make the coming season a success.
“For Uruguay, and many other countries of course, the crisis will bring about several issues for our next citrus season. For us, the issue is the region, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Even if business is possible, banking and logistics bans have already been put in place. On the other hand, if the war continues, all Southern Hemisphere suppliers will have to migrate their fruit to Europe, US, the Middle East and Asia, which will cause serious distortions in those markets for all,” says Bentancur.
“This all appears when we had already started a race in costs due to higher input costs, logistics, etc. We are predicting a very challenging season and hoping the crisis come to an end soon for everybody and specially for the people who are facing the war directly,” states Bentancur.
“While we have not started our export season yet, our fruit would have arrived in the affected region from around mid-April. Shipping companies already announced no reefers are going to that region, there might now be a diversion of fruit going to Europe, US and Asia instead. Particularly of the big players such as South Africa. There will be a distraction in other markets that’s not Russia, while some varieties will probably stay in our local market,” says Bentancur.
She says Uruguay does not export easy peelers to the UK anymore due to unaffordable tariffs as high as 14%. Diversion of fruit is also challenging given the different quality specifications as well as the differing minimum residue levels (MRL’s) allowed in each market, which according to Bentancur Uruguay is very responsible to comply with. “Our main export fruit is citrus, with harvesting for the export market starting from about week 11. We will harvest mandarins, starting with Satsumas then oranges and lemons,” says Bentancur.
During 2021 the citrus export volumes from Uruguay to Russia, Ukraine and Belarus was 5 000 tons worth $3,5 million out of just over 100 000 tons of total exports in 2021.
Bentancur says with Uruguay’s estimates for their 2022 citrus season they are hoping to have at least as much volumes as last year. “We are starting exports with the US market with high quality mandarins. We had a dry summer. Quality is good and with good volumes expected. There’s some problems of sizing we are seeing, but the March rains have come to improve this in easy peelers in some regions of the country. It is too early to talk about oranges. We have increasing lemon exports and hoping to have a good season too.”
“The sector has been restructuring with new varieties in citrus that are coming into full production. New mandarins, oranges and lemons will have a nice impact we hope, particularly to the US and Europe while we will send some to the Middle East.
“We have not been able to develop the China market as much as we had planned. This is due to logistics problems, the long distance from this market, logistical problems and lack of availability of containers and ships that was worsened by the pandemic. The cost of logistics and maritime shipping and availability of ships and containers is the biggest challenge for the coming season. Last season ships did not arrive in Montevideo, skipping our port. It was a great issue. We are going to pay $3 000-4 000 more per container. This not only affects the financial part of the business but also the quality of fruit as well. This is very critical it affects everybody. We have to be prepared to defend the quality of the fruit on arrival for clients,” concludes Bentancur.
For more information:
Marta Bentancur
UPEFRUY
Tel: +598 2916 0635
Email: [email protected]
www.uruguayfruits.com.uy