Following 12 months of discussions, visits and meetings, four vegetable producer organisations (PO) from Brittany (under the Prince de Bretagne brand) and four POs from Flanders (under the Flandria label) have set up the first pan-European association of producers organisation (APO).
On 29 November, the three main POs from Brittany, Sica de Saint Pol de Léon, Union des Coopératives de Paimpol et Tréguier and Terre de Saint Malo, plus their regional APO, Cerafel, joined the three main POs from Flanders, REO Veiling, Veiling Hoogstraten and the newly merged Coöbra-Mechelse Veiling, along with their regional APO, LAVA, to create a large-scale transnational APO.
According to a press release from French association AREFLH, this new, 'purely economic' structure will represent 7,000 growers, handling a total of 1.3m tonnes of fresh fruit and vegetables at a value of €1bn.
Dubbed FreshCoop, standing for Fresh Cooperation of POs, this organisation has three stated aims, to 'increase the transparency of market information', to 'optimise operational programmes and set up pooled actions', and to 'strengthen the producer organisation at the European level through lobbying and technical actions'.
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