Late wet weather across parts of the enlarged European Union and hail damage in the south east of England of has reduced this year’s European Union Prognosfruit assessment of the UK apple crop to marginally above last year.
Before the wet weather in July in particular, the Prognosfruit predictions forecast the UK apple crop to be 15 percent up on last year.
But the adjustment in crop tonnage downwards since then was estimated to be around four to five percent, because of the considerable hail damage.
There was no damage by wet weather and flooding to orchards or pack houses in the west Midlands or the south east, according to Adrian Barlow, chief executive, English Apples. He said that fortunately those badly hit were in the minority, with the lightly marked fruit expected to grow out.
“The multiples have indicated they propose marketing some hailed fruit and we thank them for their understanding of the situation,” said Barlow.
The experts’ view is now that the increase in the UK tonnage leaves it realistically four to five percent above the 2006 total.
Overall the modest two percent increase of the apple crop of the old member states to 6.8 million tonnes is in sharp contrast to the massive reduction of 45 percent from the crops of the new nine member states. They are expected to grow 1.7 million tonnes this year, compared with the 6.8 million tonnes from the old member states of the European Union.
The UK apple crop looks like totalling around 185,000 tonnes plus, compared with 174,000 tonnes last year.
Barlow was sure that no hailed fruit would be marketed through the supermarkets that would be a lower specification than Class II.
There would be no southern hemisphere overhang this year, he said, so a clean changeover start to the season is expected. Secondly, the two percent increase in the apple total from the old traditional EU trading states meant it is not a big crop. With the huge shortfall of the new member states it would have some effect, particularly for apples in Germany and parts of Western Europe, but it is an overall stronger market for both fresh and processed fruit.
The overall effect is that those countries would need to import apples, particularly for the large EU juicing and processing members.
Italy and France maintained their lead as the two major apple production countries with two million and 1.6 million tonnes respectively.
As far as the fresh apple market was concerned, it would be strong particularly because of the lower yields from the new members. Of the enlarged EU, Poland remained by far the largest apple grower with 1.2 million, but with a massive 46 percent decrease on 2006.
The dull weather has also affected the sales of Magners cider in the UK. The Bramley crop in Northern Ireland as a whole has received little hail damage.
The UK’s minority pear crop of an estimated 29,000 tonnes is slightly up on last year, but still five percent down over the last five year average. l
