The fall in consumption of pears must be addressed and new markets opened, delegates at last week’s Interpera conference learned.
The two-day event in Ferrara, Italy on May 27-28 welcomed 180 delegates from around the world for a series of congress sessions on innovation, production output, commercial review of past seasons and the medium to long term prospects for the fruit.
Paolo Bruni, president of CSO, the Italian market analyst and fresh produce service centre based in Ferrara that co-organised the congress, said; “It is clear that ther eis a need for increasingly focused and active measures to encourage exportation to traditional markets, but also to new destination. Global competition and the decline in consumption compel us to implement effective and co-ordinated measures to demolish the plant-health barriers that still exist in many important countries.”
Intepera delegates also analysed a comparison of costs prepared by the university of Bologna on behalf of CSO and fellow congress organiser and European trade association AREFLH. They found that Belgium and the Netherlands are able to produce and market Conference pears at lower prices than Italy, the second-largest pear producer in the world behind China. This explains the ultra-competitive nature of Benelux pears on international markets, but researchers also found that Italian favourite Abate, despite its high production costs, can compete well and remain profitable for growers when yields are sufficient.
Italy supplies about 35 per cent of total European output: some 860,000 tonnes on average and Spain accounts for about 20 per cent, although its share is declining while that of Belgium and the Netherlands at nine to10 per cent each is rising.
A spokeswoman for CSO said: “The most worrying indicators for pear-growers today not only in Italy but throughout Europe are fond on the consumer side: although pears are situated in the highest tier of the rankings for most-consumed products, the new millennium has been unfavourable for retail purchases….In fact, European pear consumption has falled by 11 per cent per capita since 2000 and in the UK per capita consumption barely exceeds 2kg a year.”
