July 11 2011, 11:17 Fruit-Inform

Fruit and vegetable prices keeping on rapidly decreasing in Ukraine

Fruit-Inform Project's fruit and vegetable index shows that last week fruit and vegetable prices decreased by 12.9% in Ukraine that is the fastest weekly decrease rate in 2011. In such a way, fruit and vegetable prices have been falling in Ukraine over eight weeks in a row, and over this period they have already decreased almost 1.5 times.

Last week the most significant contribution to fruit and vegetable price decrease was made by potatoes as the consumption share of potatoes is the largest among all fruit and vegetable consumption structure in Ukraine. Potato prices fell by 24% last week that is the sharpest decrease rate for this product in 2011. In aggregate, potatoes and borsch vegetables (onions, cabbage, beets, carrots) decreased in price by 22.8%, and for the first time in 2011 all these 5 products simultaneously became cheaper.

“Potato and borsch vegetable prices fell notwithstanding continuous rains in many Ukrainian regions that corroborates our April forecasts of sharp increase in planted areas under major traditional vegetables and potatoes”, Tetiana Getman, Head of Fruit-Inform Project, says. “Moreover, we expect further decrease in potato and borsch vegetable prices next week”, the expert continues.

For the first time within long period of time, fruit prices slightly fell too. The structure of fruit consumption is changing due to seasonal reasons, and watermelons and melons were for the first time included in calculation of fruit and vegetable index.

As to prices for main summer vegetables (tomatoes and cucumbers), they grew by 6% last week. This was caused by bad weather that led to worsening of the field-grown cucumber harvest prospects and had a negative impact on field-grown tomatoes and harvested volumes of greenhouse tomatoes.

More detailed information about price situation in the Russian and Ukrainian markets for fruits and vegetables is available for subscribers of Fruit-Inform Weekly.