Chilean Prunes - New Crop

Prunes are extremely tight in the UK market present, not many suppliers are able to offer spot material in efforts to cover booked forward sales.

New crop this year is also expected to be smaller than previous years. Last year potential production for Chilean dried plums was around 95.000 MT. However around 20.000 MT of this usually goes into the fresh market (as it provides better business for the grower) based on other years volumes. Today the estimated potential is around 75.000 MT, this year’s crop didn’t see enough chilling hours during winter, so the blooming was uneven, following this Chile then experienced a very unstable spring in terms of temperatures which effected the latest flowers. Considering all the above factors, new crop is estimated at 55.000 MT.