The association is valuing that the extension of the quota of the exceptional measures regulation should be between 30 and 40 million kilos
The General Manager of Afrucat, Manel Simón, met up with his Italian, French and Greek counterparts at the end of July to coordinate the request for an urgent meeting with the Agricultural DG of the European Commission. They want to demand an increase in the withdrawal quota of the extraordinary measures regulation by “a sufficient amount and one that reduces the high pressure that stone fruit prices are suffering this summer.”
On the 31st of July, the 9,500 million kilos corresponding to the withdrawal quota of the exceptional measures regulation came to an end. This amount has been used up by Aragón, Murcia and Catalonia, in this order.
Simón has quantified the volume that should be added to the quota as being between 30 and 40 million kilos and he emphasised the importance of this fruit not being put into circulation since “no kilo of peaches or nectarines should come on the market that has not been correctly paid for.”
The executive from Afrucat emphasised that “to the well-known situation of the Russian embargo that we have been suffering since the summer of 2014, we have to add the trade barrier that the Eurasian Customs Union (Armenia, the Russian Federation, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan) has established, increasing plant protection demands and including the fact that the producing countries must be free from Monilinia to be able to send produce. This step is “a clear prioritisation of the Turkish market as opposed to the European one and it is preventing us from reaching Belarus, one of the countries that had increased its imports most in recent years.”
