February 5 2007, 11:51

Russians are the main buyers of Polish apples despite of the banned supplies of Polish fruits to Russia

Regardless of the banned import of Polish produce to Russia, Russians are the main foreign buyers of apples in Poland, the correspondent of FreshPlaza periodical informs. Apples enter Russian market through Lithuania and Ukraine; to the opinion of the author of the article, this method makes the apple supplies legal.

But, the specialists of the Agricultural Marketing Project explained that the supplies of Polish apples to Russia really take way through the mentioned countries. But, the data about the product origin are changed, so that the apples enter Russian market as Ukrainian or Lithuanian products respectively. Naturally, these actions are illegal. The statistics says for this assumption, as Ukraine has supplied not more than 1,400 tons of apples to Russia before the Polish supplmes to Russia were banned. After the embargo was imposed (2005), the volumes of Ukrainian apple supplies to the Russian market have increased up to nearly 15,000 tons.

Polish companies have almost finished the sales of the apples from the ordinary storages. Now they start selling apples from the cold storages, and even from the storages equipped with CA systems. The sales started significantly earlier than it was a year ago. The main reason is high prices, especially for Golden Delicious, Jonagold, Ligold, and Rubin varieties.

As of February the 1st, the apples of Golden Delicious variety were sold for EUR 0.43/kg, Jonagold and Gala varieties - for EUR 0.34/kg, Ligold variety for EUR 0.43/kg on Warsaw wholesale makret.