Information for fruit and vegetables business in CIS
Russia: apple prices to grow for first time over past 4 years
The average price of apples in Russia can jump for the first time over the past four seasons.
Apple prices have been stably decreasing since 2010, and the trend only intensified after Russia's accession to the WTO in 2012. The average price of apples fell from $1.43/kg in the season 2010/11 to $0.89/kg in the season 2013/14 with the most significant decrease registered in the season 2012/13: down by 25%.
The negative price performance was connected with a continuous decrease in the import duties on apples due to WTO requirements with Poland accounting for about a half of Russia's total imports. An increase in Russian domestic production of apples was not crucial, as the share of domestic produce was not higher than 20% in Russia's market consumption of apples.
However, this year the negative price performance will most likely change into positive one due to Russia's ban on imports from the EU and Moldova. At the same time, the price growth rates will directly depend on re-exports of Moldovan and Polish apples through countries, which are not banned by Russia.