by Staff Reporter
PALMA
EXPECTATIONS of a good price for Majorcan-grown almonds this year are, at the moment, being dashed by the arrival of Californian almonds in European Union countries, whose contracted price is 3 to 3.20 euros per kilo.
As Eduard Cerda, director of Fruits Secs, explained, the crop in the Balearics this year has been more or less the same as 2006, but on the mainland the crop fell by 30 percent, so we were expecting to get a good price selling our almonds on the mainland. However, Californian almonds have arrived in the EU at 3 to 3.20 euros a kilo, which makes it difficult to charge more than that.
In 2006 the price for Balearic almonds was around 3 euros and the total crop was 2'400 tons.
Cerda added that in the face of these prices for Californian almonds, it will be difficult to get higher prices for our crop, although the manufacturers on the mainland do prefer our almonds to the Californian ones. But they could always say they can buy Californian almonds if we pitch our prices higher. The director of Fruits Secs said that, it is a bit soon to be exact about the prices which will be determined by the market but this is the current situation. We will have to wait until September to know the exact prices.