Peruvian mango exporters and producers are struggling after another year of stagnant mango production. The reason for this was bad weather that put pressure on mango trees. The hope is that they will have a better year in the coming months, however in order to do this, the weather has improved from the drying El Nino.

The largest exporter and producer has stated that “The mango season in Peru is a rough time. It is a scarce fruit and the cost to grow the fruit as well as prepare just one container are too expensive.”

The owner says that they’re in the 70% range of the normal amount however he hopes that they will see a balance at the end of this season during the season’s new phase. “The volume decreased by 70. The November volume will rise once more.”

Another major exporter of mango’s is Peru states that they experienced the highest volume of mango’s in three weeks of mango harvesting during the 3rd and 6th weeks. “The time for the fruit’s arrival occurred in the weeks of 7 through week 10. The peak of arrival was week 9.” According to the producer, Brazil is profiting from the current situation and exported more in the initial 2 months in 2024. “The alternative is that Brazil has been sending fruits all month of February, something they do not typically have to do. Brazil sent as much as 70 percent more fruit than prior year. It was mostly the Palmer varieties. The quality is lower but is sold at a cheaper that Kent.”

Producers from Brazil have said that they don’t normally send large quantities of mangoes to Europe throughout the early month of the year. In general, their market within Brazil is robust, while Peru exports its mangoes to Europe. But, because of the smaller volumes coming from Peru as well as the higher cost, it became more profitable in the case of Brazilian producers to satisfy the demands from Europe in the process of diverting mangoes that are normally to the local market.

As a result of the problems in the face of Peruvian producers, the Panama Canal delays has been adverse to fruit’s arrival, top exporters have said. “Peru has some quality issues particularly with the fruit which has gotten overripe due to slowness in transport due to the Panama Canal problems. Internal issues also exist. In week 9, the harvesting was not enough while week 10 was extremely high. This week, the final week of February, we harvested was thirty containers.”

Carlos Ivan Vilchez Peralta, president of the Peruvian Association of Mango Producers and Exporters (APEM), as well as the CEO of Dominus said there are only two weeks remaining to the close of the season, which was a year that saw 66.87 percent lower exports. The only thing they have to do is learn from the mistakes they made when pruning for the mango trees for next season.

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Peruvian Association of Mango Producers and Exporters (APEM)