Consumption of avocados in the UK market has more than doubled in just three years, and in 2007, it will hit the milestone of 1kg a person, the World Avocado Congress heard.
In his presentation “The European Market - An Importer’s View”, Gabriel Burnat of French importer Commercial Fruits detailed how both the UK and Spain had enjoyed “spectacular growth” in avocado consumption since 2004. British consumption has risen from 0.46kg to 1kg, while Spanish has grown from 0.54kg to 0.8kg.
“In Europe, the UK is now second only to France in terms of avocado consumption; penetration in this country has also grown by two percentage points to 25 per cent, in the last two years.
Burnat said there is a huge latent market for avocado consumption in Europe. In 2006-07, there were 170,000-180,000 tonnes of avocados imported into the European Union - a further 50,000t came from within the EU.
“There are 500 million people in the EU, in 27 countries, with an average consumption of 0.44kg of avocados per person. If you compare those figures with Chile or Mexico [where consumption is respectively 4-4.5kg and 10kg per person], you can see the potential for increasing the European market,” he said.
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