Figures compiled by Italy's statistical office Istat and released by fresh produce association FruitImprese have revealed that Italy's balance of trade within the fresh produce industry fell 55.3 per cent year-on-year to €555m in 2009 – representing the Italian trade's second-worst result in the past decade after 2004.
The data showed that Italy's exporters shipped a total of 3.45m tonnes of fresh fruit and vegetables worth €3.13bn last year, 4.6 per cent down on the previous year's volume and 13.5 per cent lower in terms of sales value.
Among the sectors reported to be most affected by the downturn has been the Italian citrus trade, which saw its annual export sales fall by 17.4 per cent to €148.1m on the back of a 14.8 per cent decrease in volumes to 213,000 tonnes.
The country's vegetable suppliers suffered too, with foreign markets purchasing only 832,000 tonnes compared with the 996,000 tonnes sold in 2008. As a result, sales were 2.7 per cent lower than in the previous year.
According to Istat, Italy's fresh fruit export volumes rose slightly to 2.2m tonnes, although in value terms a 20 per cent decrease meant export sales fell below the €2bn mark, ending up at €1.76bn.
There were also negative signs within the dried fruit export trade, with volumes down 0.7 per cent to 53,000 tonnes and sales 8.5 per cent lower at €217m.
In the meantime, Italians have been spending more on imported fruit. Overall spending on fresh produce imports into the country rose 8.4 per cent year-on-year to €2.57bn, while the volume of imported goods was up 11.2 per cent compared with the previous year at 3.23m tonnes.
Significantly, citrus import volumes rose 37.9 per cent to 423,000 tonnes in 2009, while sales were 16.5 per cent higher at €271.5m.
Vegetable imports amounted to 1.2m tonnes (+18 per cent) and were worth €710.5m (+20.4 per cent).
Other notable increases included the volume of imported fresh fruit (549,000 tonnes, +1.3 per cent) and dried fruit (146,000 tonnes, +12.9 per cent), which corresponded to a 0.4 per cent rise in imported fresh fruit sales to €566.6m but a 1.3 per cent drop in imported dried fruit sales to €459.7m.
For imported tropical fruit, volumes were down 0.4 per cent (873,000 tonnes) but sales rose 8.5 per cent (€565.9m) compared with the previous year.
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