MADRID: The secretary of the consortium for the promotion of broccoli, Javier Bernabéu, has confirmed that the export of this vegetable, which accounts for 90% of the production, has already stabilized, and at a “very good price for the sector,” of about 50-60 cents per kilogram at origin.
In a review of this campaign, he pointed out that the rains and frost recorded in the past months “slowed down the production, which today is already comparable to that of previous years, although this also helped keep prices at a reasonable level.”
The rise in prices due to the lower production resulted in the United Kingdom, the main consumer of Spanish broccoli, “reducing its orders until the situation normalized,” explained Bernabéu, confirming, in any case, that this “did not cause as much chaos as it seemed it would at first.”
According to the data available, “in early December they stood at around 40-50 cents per kilogram and, at the end of the same month they reached 1.5 Euro/kilo. From January until now they gradually dropped to 50-60 cents per kilogram (ignoring the exorbitant rise reached during the frost).
Spain produces about 500,000 tonnes a year on 40,000 hectares. About 50,000 of these are intended for Spanish consumption, while the other 450,000 tonnes are exported.
The United Kingdom is the main customer of Spanish broccoli, with annual purchases of about 220,000 tonnes, followed by Germany (110-120,000 tonnes per year), France, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries.
Bernabéu pointed out that the number of destinations for “Spanish broccoli has doubled in the last three years,” reaching markets like the Arab Emirates, Russia and Eastern European countries, such as Romania and Bulgaria.
