We are not facing a single bad season, but rather a new market equilibrium. A more demanding equilibrium, characterised by lower returns, less room for average-quality fruit and an increasingly clear divide between those who produce well and those who remain trapped in the middle segment.
The 2025-2026 season sent a worrying signal to the Chilean cherry industry: even with less product available, prices did not recover. Chile exported approximately 112 million boxes, around 13 million fewer than the record set the previous season, yet returns still failed to rebound.
If the problem had been exclusively a temporary oversupply, simply producing less should have been enough for the market to react. But that did not happen.
This is probably the central point of the season: we are not facing a single bad year, but a new market equilibrium. A more demanding equilibrium, characterised by lower average returns, less room for average-quality fruit and an increasingly clear divide between those who produce well and those who remain trapped in the middle segment.
From an operational standpoint, the situation can be summarised in four priorities: rigorous cost management, quality as a requirement for market access, a fruit size profile geared towards profitability, and clear-headed decision-making regarding investments, new orchards or orchard removals.
At C&D Agromanagement, we have been conducting our Cherry Settlement Analysis for seven seasons, with the aim of helping growers understand their economic results, compare the conditions offered by exporting companies and carry out production benchmarking based on real data.
This year, the sample included 37.3 million kilograms, 45 exporting companies, 31 varieties, net returns of approximately 80 million dollars (around €69.72 million) and an equivalent area of approximately 3,700 hectares, representing around 6% of the national planted area.
Beyond the size of the sample, what matters is the signal provided by the data. The weighted average net return for the 2025-2026 season was US$2.36/kg (€2.06/kg), only slightly above the US$2.27/kg (€1.98/kg) recorded in 2024-2025 and well below the US$5.26/kg (€4.58/kg) achieved in 2023-2024.
Two consecutive seasons close to the same record-low level require a change in the way the business is interpreted.
The table confirms the underlying signal highlighted at the beginning: above 100 million boxes, in the absence of significant changes in demand, the market appears to have stabilised at a lower level of returns.
The discussion, therefore, can no longer be limited to waiting for “normality to return” next year. This may in fact be the new normal.
The historical chart of returns by shipment departure week clearly highlights this change. The 2025-2026 curve remained depressed for much of the season, once again confirming how later weeks are associated with increasingly high risk.
The settlement report shows that around half of all kilograms were shipped during weeks characterised by an average return below US$2/kg (€1.74/kg), while only a small share reached or exceeded US$4/kg (€3.49/kg).
Fruit size continues to be one of the most important variables in explaining differences in returns. In the 2025-2026 season, XL fruit achieved just over US$0.6/kg (€0.52/kg), while 4J fruit reached around US$3.9/kg (€3.40/kg).
The difference remains enormous and confirms that, in many production scenarios, small-sized fruit delivers virtually no margins.
However, the message is not simply to “produce larger fruit at any cost”. The report highlights an important point: even the marginal premium associated with increasing fruit size has declined.
Over the past two seasons, moving from one size category to another has no longer guaranteed the same premiums seen in the past, and 5J appears more like an opportunity linked to specific situations than a fully reliable management objective.
The right question, therefore, is not simply how to produce more 4J or 5J fruit. We must ask how much it costs to achieve that size distribution and whether that cost is offset by the economic return.
The objective should not be to pursue the largest possible fruit size out of technical pride, but to build a commercial size profile capable of supporting profitability.
The first area requiring action is costs, without interpreting management as simply cutting expenditure. It does not mean stopping everything or turning agronomic management into a cold spreadsheet exercise.
It means changing the logic used to justify every decision.
For years, in an industry capable of generating exceptional returns, many decisions were justified with phrases such as “it is only 10 kilograms of cherries per hectare”, “it is only one extra treatment”, “you have nothing to lose” or “it makes little difference to the overall total”.
When returns were high, this way of thinking could go unnoticed. Not anymore.
In the new scenario, every peso invested must be capable of generating a return. Every treatment, intervention, consultancy service, hire or investment must answer concrete questions: how many additional kilograms does it produce? What improvement in fruit size does it generate?
What risk does it help avoid? How much value does it actually add? If the answer is unclear, we are probably dealing with an expense that needs to be reconsidered.
The cherry industry is entering a phase that other fruit sectors know very well. Table grapes, apples and other sectors characterised by tight margins have been dealing for years with crises, adjustments and highly competitive markets.
These are sectors that have effectively earned “PhDs in efficiency”: precise use of agricultural inputs, operational control, productivity per hectare, mechanisation, harvest timing and careful labour management.
The cherry industry, accustomed to extraordinary returns, still has room to learn from these sectors. Efficiency can no longer be considered an additional advantage, but a necessary condition for remaining competitive in the market.
The challenge is not to spend less as a matter of principle. It is to ensure that every expense has a clear economic objective and can justify its place in the budget.
From now on, decisions should no longer be assessed solely in terms of Chilean pesos per hectare, but in terms of return per hectare. Because when a business enters a new cycle, costs stop being judged simply by how much they cost and start being judged by the value they generate.
The signals on the varietal front must also be interpreted carefully. The three leading varieties nationwide, Lapins, Santina and Regina, continue to account for a significant share of exported volumes and also represent the largest portion of the sample analysed.
Santina continues to deliver higher returns among the highest-volume varieties, while Lapins and Regina are more affected by the pressure associated with more congested commercial windows.
The key point is not to determine whether a variety is good or bad in absolute terms. Nor can it be said that new genetics always guarantee better results.
Some may show promising signals, particularly in early windows or specific niches, but they still account for only a small share of overall volumes. Rather than drawing definitive conclusions, it is therefore necessary to continue monitoring and assessing them on the basis of one's own data.
It would nevertheless be a mistake to interpret the current stability of the leading varieties as a reason to stop looking at new alternatives. Genetic innovation is a slow process and requires years of evaluation before sound conclusions can be drawn.
The experience of crops such as table grapes shows that a significant part of the sector's renewal and competitiveness has come precisely from genetics, through the gradual replacement of varieties that for decades had seemed irreplaceable.
We do not know which varieties will dominate over the next ten years, but we do know that stopping observation, experimentation and learning from new plant material would be a mistake.
Varietal decisions should therefore be made with more caution than enthusiasm. What matters is not whether a variety is new or traditional, but whether it has a defensible commercial window, good quality, consistent keeping quality, an adequate size distribution and sufficient commercial support.
Some new varieties will probably gain ground. Others will disappear quickly. And some traditional varieties will continue to perform only when managed under very specific production and commercial conditions.
The next season does not start from scratch. It comes after two consecutive years of low returns and in an industry where a still significant area has yet to come into production.
Climate can always alter the balance, but it cannot represent a strategy. The strategy must focus on what growers can actually control: costs, productivity, quality, fruit size, fruit condition, commercial window and investment decisions.
The answer does not lie simply in waiting for a market recovery, but in improving efficiency within each farming operation, questioning every peso spent and increasing production levels to distribute fixed costs more effectively.
All of this requires clear-headedness. Some orchards will be able to compete within this new equilibrium, while others probably will not. Some varieties will continue to have a place, while others will need to be reassessed.
Certain management practices that were justified when returns were high now need to undergo a new assessment.
This is not about losing confidence in cherries. It is about no longer managing them as if the market were still the same as it was three or four seasons ago.
The 2025-2026 season confirmed that a reduction in volumes is not enough to automatically trigger a recovery in prices. The market appears to have found a new equilibrium, one that is lower and more selective.
In this scenario, the margin still within the grower's control depends less on waiting for a market reaction and far more on the ability to execute every stage of the production process correctly.
Rigorous cost management. Quality as a requirement for market access. A fruit size profile geared towards profitability, rather than technical pride. Well-planned commercial windows. Productivity per hectare.
Efficient use of agricultural inputs and labour. And timely decisions when an orchard, variety or management practice ceases to be economically sustainable.
None of this is new. What is new is that it is no longer optional.
The Chilean cherry industry remains an extraordinary, knowledgeable and technically advanced industry, with advantages that are difficult to replicate. But it has entered a more mature phase.
A phase in which simply producing cherries will no longer be enough: it will be necessary to produce the right fruit, at the right cost, in the right window, and with enough clarity to accept that every decision must be supported by an economic return.
Francisco Duboy and Sebastian Cartwright
C&D AgroManagement
Source: Vision magazine
Image source: Stefano Lugli
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