After three consecutive months officially rated as extremely warm from November to January, by February, Almeria's tomato production is said to have remained very stable throughout the winter.
"This season, in addition to having a mild winter, growers planted on time and this has helped us market more volumes than last year without the production peaks that caused prices to plummet from January 2024 onwards," says Juan Jesús Lara, manager of CASI.
The manager explains that "in 2023, the planting was delayed by between one and two weeks both in the Nijar area and in Almeria to prevent the heat from facilitating the spread of virus infections. This resulted in a delay of more than three weeks in the production. Prices were high until January due to the lower supply, but from then on, production increased by 30-40% compared to previous years, so prices fell and didn't recover for the rest of the season."
"Fortunately, and thanks to the fact that we have varieties with resistance to ToBRFV, which has given us the guarantees and security to plant at the right time, we are having a very regular season in terms of production, so we are offering great stability to our clients while also ensuring average profitability for our growers," he says.
"From now on, with the days growing longer and the coming moon phase, we expect production to increase after having slowed down in the last few weeks - which has been positive, commercially speaking - and we hope that this greater supply will be met by a similar increase in demand, which is also on the rise as spring approaches. However, we are constantly monitoring both our production and the market dynamics to allow timely planning of the necessary initiatives and promotions with our clients in times of excess volume," says Juan Jesús.
"Years ago, CASI decided to adopt a differentiation strategy"
The winter tomato market is highly dynamic in the European market, where Almeria stands as one of the EU's largest suppliers, although facing very strong competition from other Mediterranean producers.
This season, in fact, the impact of imports in the first few months has been more noticeable than in the previous campaign, since from September to November, the volume of tomatoes imported from third countries by the EU-27 has been 28% higher than last season and has stood 33.9% above the average of the last five seasons.
Morocco, which is the EU-27's main non-EU tomato supplier, with 70% of the TTPP quota, has increased its shipments in this period by 46.5% compared to the 2023/24 season when its harvest was delayed due to high temperatures and drought, and by 36.6% compared to the average.
"We have been facing competition in the European market already for many years. That is why, several years ago, CASI decided to adopt a differentiation strategy with which we could stand out from other sources and cover a market segment in which we are practically alone: specialties," says the CASI manager.
"In just 3-4 years, specialties went from 20-30% of our portfolio to 50%. We have signed exclusive contracts with seed companies for products that nobody else works with so that no other source will have that tomato during our production period. This has allowed us to cover exclusive market niches throughout Europe," he says.
"Also, many of these exclusive products are tomatoes grown during the local seasons of the countries where we are present, which entails a continuation of their domestic production during the import period, so they are highly appreciated by European consumers. We are thus moving further and further away from the commodity varieties produced in Morocco or Turkey and are developing our own market."
"We are asking seed companies to speed up the development of varieties with resistance to ToBRFV"
On January 1, a change in the regulation of the tomato brown rugose fruit virus (ToBRFV) came into force in the EU. In light of the Member States' reports and the EPPO's risk analysis, it has been concluded that, since the pest is widespread in the EU, it meets all the criteria for inclusion on the EU list of regulated non-quarantine pests.
"CASI has taken this step very cautiously. In recent years, we have had to get used to producing with the threat of the appearance of ToBRFV, and despite the fact that it has so far been handled as a quarantine pest, with the appropriate hygiene and sanitary measures we have managed to keep the pest under control," says Juan Jesús.
"We have an internal protocol in the company that covers everything, from production at source to the warehouses, which has proved to be very efficient and we are going to keep it despite the change in regulations. We cannot forget that Almeria has warmer weather than the rest of Europe and this facilitates the spread of the virus," he says.
"We are also asking seed companies to speed up the development of virus-resistant varieties. Today, around 60-70% of our varieties are resistant, but we still need this resistance in the other 30-40% of our tomatoes," says Juan Jesús Lara.
For more information:
CASI
Carretera Níjar la Cañada, s/n 04120 Almería, Spain
Tel.: +34 950 626 007
info@casi.es
https://www.casi.es