Moldova important player on market of plums from EU

Chisinau, 23 September /MOLDPRES/ - The 2024 year is a less friendly year for the plums of Moldova. The lack of precipitation in the last summer months, as well as the record air temperatures affected the quality of fruits, producers say.  

The producers also said that they had harvested smaller volumes of plums as compared to the 2023 year and the high air temperatures forced the ripening and hit the quality: many double fruits on trees, browning, epidermis hit by the drought. The export of plums from Moldova this year started earlier and 17,700 tons were exported in July-August 2024. Exporters anticipate that the season of export would be shorter for the plums of Moldova and the country this year would not reach the record from 2023, when more than 78,000 tons of plums.  

„The climate changes will have, in continuation, negative impact and will hit the production of fruits and the weather conditions of production will not return to the ones which existed ten years ago. In these circumstances, the producers who invest in the protection of harvest, quality production, irrigations, systems of depositing with control atmosphere and which unite in groups, either through stable commercial collaboration or through their affiliation with the sector association, will be the ones due to benefit. By this means, producers can get enough information about the situation on market, in order to take well thought-out decisions and, secondly, this helps them get adjusted to the market’s requirements, thus maximizing the profit and reducing the losses in the weak years,’’ marketing director at the Rural Competitiveness and Resilience Activity (RCRA) in Moldova Project of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Tatiana Burca, said.           

The representative of the Eurogroup Company, branch of the biggest global retailer, REWE Group, has recently visited Moldova on a commercial mission organized by the RCRA project. One of the conclusions is that ‘’Moldova has become an important player on the market of plums from the European Union.’’ ‘’At this point, it is essential that the producers build the quality control processes at all stages: control of the residua of pesticides, harvesting at the opportune time, permanent control at the sorting and packing line, guided by clear-cut specifications of the buyer, final control of the product and collection of samples for verification, etc. This is the responsibility of each company, in order to avoid both financial and reputational losses for the entire sector,’’ the representative of Eurogroup said.