The Russian fresh produce import business faces major disruption after the authorities in Moscow reportedly decided to impose a three-month shutdown of Pokrovskaya, the country's largest fresh produce wholesale market, with several sources close to the situation predicting the centre will never reopen.
While the official line is that the market failed to meet sanitary requirements, the decision to effectively close the market indefinitely follows violent protests earlier in the week which saw more than 1,000 people storm the centre to vent their anger at the alleged murder of a young Russian man, which they claimed had been perpretrated by one of the market's migrant workers.
Companies based at the 120,000m2 market, which is also sometimes referred to as Stupinsky after the nearby southern Moscow district, are understood to have been ordered to vacate the premises immediately and therefore leave their inventories of fruit and vegetables in the market to rot, raising the likelihood that suppliers of those goods will face an uphill struggle to obtain payment.
'Western companies that have customers at Pokrovskaya may have problems recovering money for goods delivered, because there was a real force majeure which entitles the recipient not to pay for received goods, whether or not a contract has been written on paper or even if there was an agreement over the phone,' one source told Eurofruit.
As of Wednesday 16 October, none of the market operators waiting outside the gates had been allowed back into the market, raising fears that all of the produce that remained inside would be lost. 'There is no court decision yet,' the source added, 'but this is a political issue and if politicians said the market is to be closed down then the court will tell you the same thing.'
Importers are now said to be looking at potential alternative arrangements as far as coldstorage and logistics are concerned in order to handle the impending arrival of major volumes of imported fruit, including table grapes, apples, pears and stonefruit.
It remains to be seen whether a suitable, viable alternative – one that can offer anything like the same capacity as Pokrovskaya – will be found.
Large numbers of foreign workers are employed by the various companies based at Pokrovskaya, which has an estimated annual turnover of US$9bn and handles fruit and vegetables imported from all across Europe and beyond. Many of the resident companies were founded by non-Russians, including a large number of entrepreneurs from neighbouring Azerbaijan who relocated to Moscow while their homeland was part of the former USSR.
Around 2,000 trucks arrive at the centre from Europe every day, carrying products including strawberries, cherries, exotics, vegetables and mixed shipments mainly from the Netherlands.
