Newly released figures have shown that fresh fruit imports to Spain increased by 4.4 per cent in 2008 compared with the year before, while fruit exports from the Mediterranean country dropped by 7 per cent.
Fruit imports to Spain, dominated by apples, kiwifruit, citrus and bananas, reached 1.3m tonnes during the year, which have been valued at over €1m, up 9 per cent in value over 2007.
According to data from Spanish Customs and processed by national fresh produce federation Fepex, the total value of fruit and vegetables imported by Spain in 2008 increased by 3.5 per cent to €1.5m compared with the previous year.
In volume terms, fresh produce imports rose by 2.4 per cent in total to 2.6m tonnes, due principally to an increase in fruit imports.
The figures revealed that kiwifruit and banana imports increased by 3 per cent and 7 per cent respectively by volume, although apple import volumes fell by 7 per cent.
However, in value terms, apple imports increased by 1 per cent and kiwifruit imports by 28 per cent, although the value of orange imports dropped by 16 per cent.
At the same time, while the value of Spanish fruit and vegetable exports topped more than €8m for the first time, overall exports volumes fell by 1.8 per cent to 9.4m tonnes compared with 2007.
Fruit export volumes in particular dropped by 7 per cent to 5.4m tonnes, which was partly due to an especially poor citrus harvest. By contrast, vegetable export volumes increased by 6.3 per cent to 3.9m tonnes compared with the previous 12 months.
