The 2024 Apulian cherry season seems to be promising: there is a climate of confidence and positivity among operators in Apulia and it was needed after a 2023 that left a bitter taste in the mouth.
While news arrives from the region of the very first symbolic harvests in the Barletta area, from the Bari area there is confirmation of an early season: 'Soon we will start harvesting,' Alessandro Nisi, sales manager of Di Palma Food , confirmed. 'We have had a good blooming, an abundance of flowers, avoided frost so far. In short, the weather has been kind and we should be heading for a pleasant season'.
Image 1: Ceraseto in bloom - Archive photo. Source: Alessandro Nisi - Di Palma Food.
"There are 15 days ahead of the normal season," is also the confirmation of Vito Valenzano, one of the owners of Fra.Va, "For the moment everything is going well. There are the right temperatures, we have no humidity in the morning. I was worried about thepoor accumulation of cold weather , but visiting the fields I instead found a good amount of product, at least on the early varieties. If the weather assists us, we will do well this year. The late varieties are still in flower , so I wouldn't like to overstate myself.
Di Palma Food and Fra.Va market cherries, as does Giacovelli. All three companies are located in the province of Bari. "This early season of about 20 days, if the weather holds, will allow us to reach the markets a little earlier with the Italian product and that is a good thing,' Anna Giacovelli, Giacovelli's Business Development Manager, told us.
The Bari area and Puglia in general play a leading role in the Italian cherry sector. Of the approximately 28,300 hectares in production (2023 Istat data), 17,535 are in Apulia, well over half. Production is concentrated in the Bari area with 17,230 hectares in production.
According to RICA, the Agricultural Accounting Information Network, Apulia is worth 30% of Italy's cerasic production. However, yields are the lowest in Italy with 17.6 q/ha against an Italian average of 35 q/ha (2019/2021 data).
While the start of the season seems to have got off on the right foot, for all three interviewees it is too early to make price predictions. In Apulia, the first variety to arrive is, in principle, Bigarreau, although other early varieties such as Nimba and Pacific Red are also present.
The prices of the first few days, however, should not be dazzling: 'For those who have covers, for the Bigarreau cherries that arrive first, you can usually get as much as 15, 20 euros per kg, but it is not with these cherries that you make volume. This is product that goes to particular shops in Milan or Florence.
It is when you start having volumes to settle with the supermarkets that the season really starts and if you manage to stay between 4 and 5 euro at the producers, at the beginning of May, then the year is going well. We should really start at the end of the month, now it's too early to make forecasts,' Vito Valenzano of Fra.Va, a company that has its processing in Rutigliano, and to which producers from Conversano, Turi, San Michele and Bisceglie contribute.
Fra.Va markets around 25,000 quintals of cherries in a standard season, which mainly end up on the shelves of Italian supermarkets. Only between 10 and 20 per cent of the Fra.Va cherries go abroad, to Germany, Austria and to a small extent to northern countries such as Sweden.
Image 2: Pack of premium cherries. Source: Fra.Va.
On the contrary, Giacovelli, a company founded in the 1950s with 50,000 quintals marketed on average per year, mainly looks abroad, mainly to Switzerland, Germany and France (Italy is worth 30/35% of turnover, mainly in northern Italian supermarkets).
"For us, who are mainly exporters, the campaign kicks off with Giorgia, a variety that is harvested immediately after Bigarreau. Unfortunately Bigarreau is not suitable for export, it does not hold up,' Anna Giacovelli commented. Pietro Giacovelli, owner of the company, is optimistic about 2024: "Based on the current climate, considering that the campaign will be longer, given the advance, we will have a season of balanced prices that will favour producers and consumers.
In Apulia, the queen variety is still the Ferrovia: 'It is with the Ferrovia, around 15-20 May usually, that the global market for Apulia cherries really opens up. With the Ferrovia it goes on for 40, sometimes even 50 days. The Ferrovia has special characteristics linked to the territory, it has a deep red colour, pink flesh, is crunchy and pleasant to taste. He is lucky if he can taste it,' Alessandro Nisi of Di Palma Food told us again.
The company, which sells a volume of around 8/9000 quintals a year, has a historical supplier park that it cultivates in the vocated area of Bari. It covers around 100 hectares between San Michele, Conversano, Turi and Castellana. 'In recent years we have also been looking northwards, in the area of Bisceglie and Andria'.
The cherries processed by Di Palma see Germany as their most important market abroad. Their main market, however, remains Italy, with the large-scale retail trade accounting for 50% of the marketed volumes.
Giacovelli has also invested heavily in Ferrovia, and in particular the company has worked on post-production to be able to extend the life of the Apulian queen as much as possible: 'We have equipped ourselves,' Anna Giacovelli, Giacovelli's Business Development Manager, told us, 'with an optical gra der for processing in the Turi plant.
"It is the latest generation of machinery, with the possibility of perfect sorting, with infrared cameras, giving us colour, calibre, and product perfection. Everything is done in cold water, from emptying to packaging, to avoid thermal stress and damage to the fresh product so that we can guarantee high quality and shelf-life for our customers. But it is not only a question of technology'.
Image 3: Calibrator - Archive photo. Source: Alessandro Nisi - Di Palma Food.
"We have worked on many details that make a difference: from the temperature of the grader water to the temperature and humidity of the cells for example. We are also starting to do the same work in the field, with our producers. In Apulia there are 7,120 companies producing cherries. In addition to the strongly felt problems of fragmentation, everyone agrees on the need to renew plantings and make varietal changes to keep up with market demands.
On four of our hectares," Vito Valenzano of Fra.Va told us, "we are testing four early varieties with low cold requirements from Californian IFG: Cherry Burst®, Cherry Cupid®, Cherry Nebula® and Cherry Treat®. We have just planted them, but the aim is to check if they are good varieties, hoping then to stimulate producers to invest in new varieties and to renew their plants, also equipping them with covers and nets to protect them from rain and insects".
'In the area north of Bari we are starting to see the first new plantings,' stressed Alessandro Nisi, of Di Palma Food, in a voice full of hope. 'They are young entrepreneurs, they have combined the breeding form with modern plantings, with covers, even lateral ones. There they anticipate the season and with early crops they get better prices. We would like to bring this innovation also to Conversano, the objective is to protect'.
Among the emerging issues of concern is unfortunately the arrival last year of the dreaded alien insect Drosophila suzukii. An adversity that is practically impossible to defeat without protective nets.
The Giacovelli company is also convinced that the trump card is varietal renewal: 'Currently, the core business of cherries is still the Ferrovia. In Apulia, however, a strong varietal change is taking place. Over the next five years, this will allow us to have a broader planning for the supply of Italian products,' Anna Giacovelli continued.
While waiting for what operators have called 'a change of mentality', what marketers can do is to invest in post-production. On the one hand the optical grader, which is a must in warehouses, and the search for perfect storage conditions, on the other hand the work on packaging that all the stakeholders heard is being carried out, both to meet the demands for greater environmental sustainability and to lengthen the shelf life of the product.
And when packaging hits the mark, it's gratifying: 'We tried a box with just 41 fruits ,' Valenzano told us, ' arranged one by one in alveoli, all of the same size. Last year it went very well. We had designed it for boutiques but it was also very popular in supermarkets. People mostly buy it online and bring it as a gift, on dinner invitations, a bit like you do with a bottle of wine. Of course it is a niche, but seeing that it works gives great satisfaction'.
Barbara Righini
Opening iamge: Alessandro Nisi - Di Palma Food
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