ASTANA: Kazakhstan has been rapidly increasing apple imports in the current season, and they will most likely reach 5-year high, according to Fruit-Inform.
The country has imported 120,000 tons of apples in July 2014 – April 2015 against slightly less than 100,000 tons in the same period of the previous season.
Poland has been the leader in apple exports to Kazakhstan for the third year in a row, and the share of Polish apples accounted for more than a half of Kazakhstan’s total imports.
Analysts also say of Kazakh importers’ higher demand for Moldovan apples. Moldova has shipped 25,000 tons of apples to Kazakhstan in July 2014 – April 2015, almost 7 times as high as in the same period of the previous season. As a result, Moldova was the second largest exporter of apples to Kazakhstan in the current season, and China ranked only third.
A steady increase in the EU apple exports to Kazakhstan over the past 5 years should also be noted. Kazakhstan has imported 64,000 tons of European apples (mostly Polish ones) in the current season against just 18,000 tons in the season 2010/11.
Analysts believe that such a sharp rise in imports was registered due to record high volumes of re-exports of apples to Russia under conditions of the ban on imports of European and Moldovan fruits introduced by that country.
