Irish apple growers are reporting production drops as high as 70 per cent due to the severe cold spell in spring and the heavy rain in summer, sparking fears of significant rises in fruit, juice, jam and cider prices.
“I’ve one more day’s picking left and I reckon my crop will come in at about 30 per cent of where we hoped it would be,” said James Scannell, an Irish apple grower who supplies his apples to Irish cider manufacturer Bulmers (known as Magners in the UK). “We are picking every apple we can and while there’s great potential for next year, weather-wise it’s still in the lap of the gods.”
A spokesperson for Bulmers confirmed that the strength of the 2010 and 2011 harvests “will help to compensate for this year’s poor harvest,” and that the company will not need to increase prices because it stockpiles 18 months of fruit juice in large storage tanks.
Meanwhile, smaller-scale apple farmers in Ireland are facing a much more serious situation.
“Our crop overall is down significantly,” said Cork grower Maurice Gilbert of Ballyhoura Apple Farm.
“One of our significant varieties Dilinco, which represents over 40 per cent of our crop, budded very early in the springtime, and with the severe frost – temperatures in Ireland fell at the times to unseasonably low levels of minus five or six degrees – the trees simply weren’t able to cope and they bore no fruit.”
Gilbert also confirmed that his Discovery crop has been affected due to cracking and rotting from heavy rainfall, but he remains optimistic of a good harvest in 2013 as “the trees have rested well this year”.
The unpredictable weather has had a similar impact on UK production, with Adrian Barlow, chief executive of English Apples & Pears, describing the season as a “temporary blip”.
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