Wetter weather this 2024 season is having an impact on Argentina's citrus sector, with lower volumes harvested and exported to date compared to last year. Some fruit is being diverted to the juice market, as the industry focuses on sending adequate quality fruit to markets, says Jorge Amigo, manager of the Argentine Citrus Federation (FederCitrus).
According to Amigo, the United States continues to be the main market for fresh Argentine citrus fruits, while less volume is destined for Europe. "FederCitrus estimates 290,000 tons of mandarins, 750,000 tons of oranges and 1,700.000 tons of lemons, while grapefruit has become a fruit of limited export and its production will not exceed 55,000 tons."
The Argentine citrus industry is packing carefully, which has slowed the pace of harvesting. More fruit is also destined for juicing, since industrial products derived from oranges have sustained demand. The quality and health have been acceptable and as Amigo mentioned, significant volumes are destined for the industry. This has an impact on the pace of exports.
As for the markets: "this season, the trend towards the United States as the main market would continue. The volumes exported to the European Union are not expected to be great, especially for Argentine lemons. This is due to lower prices in that region, affected by the longer Spanish season and shipments from other countries in the Southern Hemisphere. So far, this export season has recorded a drop of between 15% and 20% compared to the same week of the previous year. So far this year, fresh citrus exports reached only 114,000 tons of lemons, 16,000 tons of oranges and 13,000 tons of mandarins," says Amigo.
He provides an update on the different citrus producing areas in Argentina. In the NOA areas that make up the Northwest provinces where the Lemon Cluster is concentrated, "in terms of implementation, a possible substitution of hectares of lemon for hectares of orange is observed in the coming years due to profitability issues."
For the NEA, Provinces of the Argentine Northeast, "although the Mandarin is kept as a main variety, the oranges are mainly used to make juices. We are in a moment of unusual increased demand for derivatives and industries, which is why this sector is working hard to meet this demand," explains Amigo.
For more information:
Jorge Amigo
FederCitrus
www.federcitrus.org