Although, if we look at the countryside, what has accumulated the most headlines in recent days is the extremely high price of oil (9 euros per liter), it is convenient not to lose sight of two other products that are also becoming considerably more expensive due to the drought.
It’s about oranges and tangerines. As collected by the specialized portal FreshPlazathe first estimates made by different producer organizations for the 2023-2024 campaign anticipate a slight decrease in production that will cause a rise in prices.
Specifically, the elements that explain this detrimental situation for pockets are the adverse weather events that took place last winter and, of course, the high temperatures and lack of rainfall in spring and summer.
In this way, the production of oranges and mandarins will be even lower than that of the previous season, which was already the lowest in the last seven years.
The aforementioned medium explains that, taking into account these bad forecasts, the operations to purchase produce in the field prior to the start of the harvest have been launched at a higher rate than usual, especially in the case of oranges.
And this aforementioned drop in the supply of oranges and tangerines is causing, according to some merchants consulted by FreshPaza, the starting prices offered by farmers to be higher than those registered on the same dates last year.
For example, the Lonja de Cítricos de Valencia, in addition to verifying that purchase operations have started earlier than in 2022, reflects that in Satsuma-type mandarins, such as Okitsu and Owari, the average prices stand at 0.32 and 0 .27 euros per kilo, respectively. Both figures represent about 5 cents more than in the first week of September 2022.
Likewise, in the initial operations of Oronules, the kilo is being paid at an average of 0.58 euros per kilo, a price well above the 0.43 euros at which each kilo was estimated at the beginning of September 2022.
