Higher Costs Prevent Growers from Investing
2022-05-30 
2022-05-30 Article by: Hari Yellina
According to Jakub Krawczyk, export manager at Appolonia, “it’s been a really difficult season for Polish apple exporters, especially when compared to the previous season.” “Our apple season hasn’t ended yet. The season wasn’t simple, and we ran into some challenges with our apple sales at times. Sales were running well up until December. However, between January and April, sales were at an all-time low, and we were concerned about whether we would be able to sell all of our apples. “Fortunately, in May, Belarus reopened their market for our apples, and the Polish government launched a scheme to financially support growers who sell their apples for industrial uses.”
For all apples, the price increased instantly by 0.07 to 0.08 euro, which was a very excellent option for the growers. It was the show we’d all been waiting for.” Both the virus and the crisis in Ukraine made the season challenging, according to Krawczyk. “It’s no surprise that the epidemic presented unique obstacles, but our government recently stated that the outbreak was gone. This means that all stores, schools, and services are back to normal. However, the Ukrainian conflict problem continues, and it will have an impact on us for a long time to come, and we still don’t know how the situation will be resolved.
As a result, there is a lot of inflation, and everything is getting more expensive. Higher costs will discourage some growers from investing in their orchards, as well as have a negative impact on product quality.” “We started sorting on our new packing line in December, so it was critical for us to open another packhouse and be able to sell additional apples.” Fortunately, we were able to develop the facility after another significant price increase,” says Krawczyk.
Appolonia, on the other hand, had no problems with containers because they did not ship to Egypt: “We heard about some problems with Polish apple containers stuck in Egyptian ports, but to be honest, we don’t have any containers in such a situation because we didn’t send any apples to Egypt in 2022.” We simply hope that exporters who are experiencing this issue are permitted to access the port with their goods.” Consumers spend less money on apples as a result of inflation, according to Krawczyk: “In general, apple consumption has fallen a bit, and our figures show we didn’t sell as many apples as last season.”
Sales were much lower from January to the end of April. People in the EU are more likely to prefer other products simply because they have less money to spend. The previous season had been extremely strong in terms of sales for our company, but this one has been really trying and difficult.” “For the upcoming season, we would like to resume large-scale cooperation with our Egyptian customers; although the Letter of Credit has temporarily halted sales, we are certain that we can resume operations.” With our new sorting lines, it will be easier and faster for us to create more 18 kg bushel orders for our Indian partners, therefore we expect to send larger volumes in the upcoming new season.