Information for fruit and vegetables business in CIS
An unexpected decrease in Ukrainian fresh produce price index before holidays
Fruit-Inform's Ukrainian fresh produce price index decreased by 2.4% last week, after an increase of 67% over the past four weeks, despite the market participants' expectations of a surge in demand before May holidays in the country. At the same time, current fresh produce price level is 93% higher year-on-year in Ukraine.
“As we had warned a week earlier, a too rapid increase in growers' prices of traditional vegetables (onions, white cabbage, beetroots, carrots) and potatoes led to difficult situation in the market: the country almost lost the export market due to uncompetitiveness of Ukrainian vegetables, and consumption in the internal market also decreased”, says Ms. Tetiana Getman, Head of Fruit-Inform. “In such a way, prices of traditional vegetables decreased by 5% last week; potatoes became 2% less expensive”.
Cucumbers and tomatoes also decreased in price by 5.6% due to lower demand in the export markets despite closer holidays. At the same time, the fruit index became 1% higher thanks to an increase in prices of apples and lemons, which was not compensated by a continuous decrease in banana prices.
We would remind you that more information about current developments and future prospects in the Ukrainian and Russian fruit and vegetable markets is available for subscribers of Fruit-Inform Weekly service package.