Spanish stone-fruit growers are coming together on May 19 this year to celebrate their first national congress to address problems faced by the sector.
The stone fruit committee of the federation of producer-exporters (Fepex) will bring together representatives from the sector in all the main production areas - Catalonia, Andalusia, Aragon, La Rioja, Extremadura, Murcia and Valencia to find a way forward following recent seasons of low prices. The meeting will hope to adopt a series of measures aimed at improving orchards, the quality of products, handling and storage as well as sales and marketing in the production areas themselves and further afield in destination markets.
Fepex also hopes to address some of the issues facing the top-fruit sector and to draw up a national strategy for both types of fruit which will be communicated to national rural development authorities and regional executives.
Spanish stone fruit production reached 1.618 million tonnes last season. Some 573,000t were exported with a total value of €501m.
