`Domestic Olive Oil Sales in Spain Remain Strong as Exports Fall - Olive Oil Times
enEnglish
enEnglishfrFrançaiselελληνικάdeDeutscheitItalianozh-CN中文ptPortuguêsesEspañoltrTürkçehrHrvatskija日本語hiहिंदी
enEnglish
enEnglishfrFrançaiselελληνικάdeDeutscheitItalianozh-CN中文ptPortuguêsesEspañoltrTürkçehrHrvatskija日本語hiहिंदी

Domestic Olive Oil Sales in Spain Remain Strong as Exports Fall

By Máté Pálfi
Jun. 27, 2023 15:11 UTC

Despite Spain’s his­tor­i­cally low har­vest, esti­mated to be just 662,411 tons, domes­tic sales have remained strong in the first half of 2023.

According to Cristóbal Cano, the sec­re­tary gen­eral of the Union of Small Farmers (UPA), olive oil sales in May reached 94,350 tons, includ­ing 12,000 tons of imported oils.

Overall, exports and domes­tic sales in Spain reached 731,220 tons of olive oil in the first eight months of the mar­ket­ing year, which began in October 2022.

See Also:Farmers and Consumers React to Rising Olive Oil Prices

Cano said these fig­ures demon­strate strong domes­tic demand for olive oil, despite the record-high prices at ori­gin for all grades of olive oil. ​“This shows that the con­sumer is faith­ful to the health­i­est fat that exists,” he said.

While strong sales have buoyed the sec­tor’s con­fi­dence, there has been increas­ing con­cern that the 526,000 tons of olive oil stocks, the low­est total in recent years, will be enough to tide the mar­ket over until the start of the 2023/24 har­vest.

“[Spain’s] very low pro­duc­tion means that, despite the fact that sales have sta­bi­lized, we will not reach an avail­able vol­ume of more than 1,370,000 tons, includ­ing imports, stock and final pro­duc­tion,” Cano said.

“A piece of infor­ma­tion that, not because it was expected, is no longer wor­ry­ing and con­firms our bad fore­casts of reach­ing the low­est stock between cam­paigns in recent years,” he added.

Despite strong domes­tic sales, lower pro­duc­tion has resulted in Spanish olive oil exports falling by 30 per­cent by vol­ume in the first sixth month of the mar­ket­ing year. However, ris­ing prices mean exports by value only dropped by 5 per­cent, with sales abroad earn­ing €1.6 bil­lion.

According to data from Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Spain has exported 397,000 tons of olive oil since the start of the mar­ket­ing year. Cooperatives esti­mate that May’s exports will reach 58,810 tons.

By des­ti­na­tion, exports have fallen with all of Spain’s trad­ing part­ners, with the excep­tion of Russia, to which exports increased by 8 per­cent in the first half of the cur­rent crop year.

Shipments to Italy, the largest buyer of Spanish olive oil, dropped by more than 50 per­cent in that time, falling to 71,325 tons.

To off­set the coun­try’s poor pro­duc­tion, imports increased by 1 per­cent in vol­ume but, again, due to higher prices, rose by 43 per­cent in value.

While imports remained steady from Portugal (45,723 tons) and Tunisia (32,300 tons), the two largest exporters to Spain, pur­chases from Greece (13,310 tons), Turkey (7,276 tons) and Italy (8,856 tons) increased.

“Consumption con­tin­ues to be guar­an­teed,” Cano said. ​“Sufficient oil is avail­able to guar­an­tee sup­ply. And the price is cur­rently sta­bi­lized at rea­son­able lev­els for the tra­di­tional olive grove.”

“We are going to find the prob­lem with the next crop year because the rains that have fallen, although they have been good, will not alle­vi­ate the large losses that we have suf­fered due to the high tem­per­a­tures of last April,” he con­cluded.

More articles on:  , ,

Advertisement
Advertisement

Related Articles