Price crash on cherries

Thursday, August 13, 2009

by SUSAN MANN

Consumers were the only winner from this year’s oversupply of the sweet cherry market as Americans harvested a monster-sized crop that was up 60 per cent compared to last year.

 Len Troup, chair of the Ontario Tender Fruit Producers’ Marketing Board, says consumers got deals on cherries while growers took a price hit. There were cherry prices in supermarkets that were “way below the cost of production.”

Troup says the huge American crop was “out of control” this year. “They never did sell all their cherries” He thinks American cherry growers just gave up and stopped harvesting because the whole market was just so oversupplied. The American crop was sold all over North American and probably across the Pacific.

Adrian Huisman, board general manager, says the U.S. crop estimate for sweet cherries was 680 million pounds, while Ontario usually produces one to two million pounds.

The cherry harvest in the Untied States lasts for at least two months and starts way before Ontario’s. “By the time we came into production the market was already loaded up with cherries,” says Troup, adding the market oversupply was predicted because too many cherry trees were planted during the past few years. “They all came into bearing with a good crop this year.” The oversupply drove all the prices down.

Ontario prices were “too low to begin with and then it just deteriorated,” Troup says, noting he didn’t want to give figures. Provincial cherry growers faced a number of additional problems, including declining quality due to frequent rain during harvest.

Federal NDP agriculture critic Alex Atamanenko has called on Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz to do something even it means risking trade action. In an email to Better Farming, Ritz called the NDP proposal “short-sighted and ridiculous.” Farmers want to make their money in the marketplace “so we will continue to create opportunities for them that work with our international trade agreements.” BF