Farmers celebrate that the weather, although so different from usual for these dates, is allowing the loquat to go to the market earlier and not compete with other seasonal fruits such as apricots, cherries or peaches. But this advantage that climate change unintentionally gives it faces other drawbacks, as LA UNIÓ Llauradora i Ramadera explains. In the Callosa d’En Sarrià Cooperative, where between 75-80% of the total production of loquats in the Valencian Community is marketed, this year a production of close to 8,000 tons is expected compared to the usual 11,000.
In general, in all the producing areas of the Valencian Community there will be around 10,000 tons, which represents a decrease of 30% compared to the last campaign (14,000 tons) as a consequence, they warn, of the meteorological adversities, mainly due to the lack of rains.
The absence of precipitation has also brought a drop in size, although they point out that, positively, this has meant that the quality and organoleptic qualities of the fruit are “exceptional” this year. In addition to the good quality that they proclaim, this year there will be a higher price, since compared to the previous campaign there has been a price increase of 50%. For his part, Carles Peris, general secretary of LA UNIÓ, indicates that it is “essential to continue growing loquats in the Marina Baixa and other areas so that consumers in the Valencian Community can continue enjoying high quality loquats from the territory.” .
However, farmers explain that this increase has not had an impact on the producers’ income and point out that production costs continue to rise and one of the most important is labor: only in the Callosa d’En Sarrià area are between 500 and 1,000 day laborers per campaign. Likewise, Peris states that “it is a product that has a high production cost due to its careful agronomic handling that requires manual tasks such as rinsing to obtain an adequate size, careful harvesting and subsequent manual packing. All this is reason enough for it to have a sufficient and fair price on the shelves to compensate for this entire process.”
According to LA UNIÓ, in these last days of April, almost 75% of the production has been practically harvested in the Callosa d’En Sarrià DO area, so it is expected that everything will be harvested by mid-May. The other producing area is missing, Alto Palancia, where there are plantations in Segorbe, Castellnovo and Soneja.
Here, they warn, there will be a “normal and good caliber” production. Without frost, the fruit presents an “excellent” quality and the lack of precipitation has avoided phytosanitary problems. In June the harvest will be in this second loquat area in the Valencian Community, where they warn that production is residual due to the high abandonment of the fields. They warn that in the last ten years the region has lost almost 90% of the existing plantations.
