It’s not all that often that you hear the French and the English sing from the same hymn sheet.

But you will see inside this week’s FPJ that the mouthpieces for the countries’ respective apple industries are flagging the harsh realities of another high-volume, low-price season. On both sides of the Channel, the stark prediction is that this season’s end will see the departure of growers and grubbing of orchards, forced out of the industry by a consistent lack of sustainable returns.

But will this lead to the result the market most needs - reduced volumes of fruit? If the situation in New Zealand is anything to go by, then the answer is, at best, possibly and realistically, probably not. Already, the short and medium-term crop forecasts from the land of the long, white cloud suggest that volume will soon be up and around the levels that caused the Kiwis so much heartache in Europe in 2005.

Oversupply, static demand and high-street price competition are not happy bedfellows.

Until growers in major producing nations take it upon themselves to sort out their own part in the global mess, rather than relying on their competitors elsewhere to do the same, the overhang of fruit at the end of each hemisphere’s natural window will worsen, playing into the hands of buyers who want cheap fruit.

I don’t envy the borderline apple grower. There are some tough decisions ahead.