Changes in the EU banana regime on January 1, are bringing new operators into the fiercely competitive market.
Guatemala, which has not supplied the EU for several years since the licensing system was introduced, made its re-entry last week with the arrival of reefer Green Maloy into Rotterdam to discharge 113,712 boxes of Lola branded fruit. High-ranking Guatemalan diplomats including Eduardo Sperisen-Yurt, the Central American country’s ambassador to the World Trade Organisation welcomed the shipment at the quayside.
Lola plans to ship some 8 million cartons of bananas and 2 million cartons of pineapple to the EU this year.
Mexico’s San Carlos group is also entering the EU market with its first arrival of bananas expected on the Continent in the next few weeks. Like Lola, San Carlos also produces pineapples in Tabasco, southern Mexico.
The company has been increasing plantations and upgrading standards to meet EurepGAP requirements. “The domestic market in Mexico is very strong, but with increasing volumes new markets must be developed,” said Karla Celorio, marketing director at San Carlos. “The aim is to grow step by step on the European market, finding strategic partners to grow and develop with us for the long term.”
Meanwhile, exporters in Ecuador are getting disgruntled at the increasing competition. According to Alfredo Montalvo, president of the country’s association of banana exporters, AEBE, exporters from Brazil and Guatemala are undercutting Ecuador on price selling as low as €3.50 below the cost of Ecuadorian fruit.
“Guatemala used to send its fruit to the US, but now it prefers the EU,” Montalvo was reported in the Guayaquil press. “With lower production costs and greater productivity, they want to take market share from us.”
And Bonita’s European manager Paul Trauger pointed out in press reports that margins have been as little as $0.25-0.50 so far this year - a period in which they are usually higher to act as a cushion for lower points in the season traditionally from May to November. “This system that EU has put in place is a fiasco,” he was reported as saying.
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