Soft Underberry

Weak demand has hit home for strawberry producers in a year in which volumes have doubled.

A big increase in production following last years excellent sales, has not been matched by demand, predominantly due to the poor summer, said Ian Waller, the sales director of Summerfruit Company.

"We're seeing a big increase in production of around 800 to 1,000 tonnes extra a week, year on year. We've had nearly double the volumes compares with last year."

He said the bad weather had also delayed the Uk strawberry season, which meant production didn't come into full swing until August, traditionally a period of lower demand.

Meanwhile raspberries too have suffered from a delay in production, although the English autumn crop is now expected to come fully on stream.

Waller said the increasing Uk volumes would being to displace imported product, following several weeks of US raspberries dominating the shelves.

While both quality and availability is looking good, raspberries, like strawberries have also been suffering from weaker demand due to the miserable spell of weather.

On the other hand blueberries appear to be going from strength to strength, off the back of recent widespread media exposure from a recent British Summer Fruits campaign.

"Demand has been fantastic" said Waller. "The excellent and extensive coverage in the national press, extolling the health benefits of blueberries, has seen demand double. it just goes to show the power of a positive press."

He said that demand was likely to be further fuelled by good volumes of excellent quality fruit coming in from Poland over the next few weeks. "There's sufficient fruit to increase programmes as required." he added.

Blackberry production unlike strawberries has weathered the storm of low public uptake by maintaining a better balance between volume and demand., although consumer demand has been reasonable said Waller.

On the stonefruit front, Victoria plums are now in full swing and sales are starting to pick up following a slow start to the season, said Waller.

"Sales were slow to build, but we're starting to see them increase quite dramatically, giving us good up-lift in the later part of the season. The fruit is excellent quality and good flavour and we're hoping the sales increase is due to repeat purchases."

Availability is expected to be excellent over the next two to three weeks and Marjorie Seedling will come on stream in around a fortnight, which will provide continuity for any programmes.

Again, however the weather conditions have caused prpoblems for plums, with fruit not being expected to store for as long as normal, Waller added.

Fresh Produce Journal, September 3rd 2004