Due to the general shortage of softfruit, the market in Italy is getting stronger, ready to face the last weeks of the year and the holiday period, in which the demand usually increases.

Blueberries

The prices for Peruvian blueberries recently increased but they are still quite weak (as low as €7.00/Kg delivered Italy for punneted blueberries) and only few shippers are dealing with Italy at the moment, while most of them are targeting to better returns in the Northern European markets.

The volumes from Peru will go down week by week until the mid of December, when the Chilean fruit will start to flow into Europe.

We expect the Peruvians to increase prices again from next week on and hope that the Italian retailers will positively react to the price increase (at the moment they are still buying for €0.90 per punnet and selling in the stores for €2.99, with very low returns to importers and excessive margin for the retailer).

Raspberries

We are experiencing low volumes and even worse demand of raspberries, especially variety Adelita, which production is almost completely stuck in Spain.

Morocco and Portugal are offering for €8.80/Kg delivered Italy. The sales in Italy are slow but hopefully they will follow the blueberry trend and increase the demand in the next few weeks.

Blackberries

The market for blackberries is quite strong, with prices for Mexican or Portuguese around €10.40/Kg delivered. The volumes available are very short, but the quality is good, especially for Mexican fruit.

Retail prices

The next report about retail prices will be published Tuesday 26/11/2019. The latest survey (Firenze 06/11/2019) is still available here.

Photo: Berry display at Eurospar Cabassi in Modena (21/11/2019)