July 18 2006, 09:42

Egg-plant price is expected to decline two-fold this week in Kyiv

The price for egg-plant is rapidly decreasing because of large shipments of field vegetables entering the market. This information was provided to "Agrooglyad: Vegetables and Fruits" journal by Roman Rybalko, the Wholesale Price Monitoring Specialist of the Agricultural Marketing Project. Small wholesale shipments of egg-plant have decreased two-fold in price during one week on KOPANI market, Kherson oblast. The price went down from $0.58/kg to $0.29/kg. As a result, the respective price decrease for egg-plant is expected to happen soon in Kyiv too, as major part of these vegetables is supplied to Kyiv exactly from Kherson oblast. Egg-plant prices were 10-50% higher at the same period of time past year. However, in early August 2005 egg-plant was sold for $0.15/kg in Kherson oblast.

According to data of the official statistics, gross harvest of egg-plants has increased 50% since 2000; the stable growth is obvious. A gross harvest increased due to yield growth (the farmers use better yielding varieties and hybrids); at the same time, cultivation areas are even reduced a little bit. This year, according to the forecast done by the Agricultural Marketing Project, egg-plant harvest will be larger; it will probably reach top level for seven recent years. Harvest growth will constitute 13%; production volume can reach 68,000 tons.

Egg-plant is a well-known and popular crop in Ukraine; the consumption of this vegetable is steadily growing these years. People tend to diversify traditional meals; canneries show more interest to egg-plant. Speaking about peculiarities of egg-plant consumption, there is a rather strong regional differentiation of demand for this vegetable. The traditions of egg-plant consumption play their great role here. For example, Odesa inhabitants eat egg-plants in large quantities; they can not imagine any celebration without egg-plant course. In Lviv oblast, for example, many families have never tried this vegetable, and the consumption is quite lower.