Opinions vary between two Serbian apple exporters as to exactly how much shipments will increase to Russia, now that the ex-Soviet nation has blocked imports from EU-member countries and the U.S. 

Prominent apple-exporting nation Poland is included on the blacklist of countries, and in 2013 Russia reportedly accounted for 56% of foreign trade for the fruit.

A representative of Serbia-based Apple World d.o.o. told www.freshfruitportal.com despite the reduced supply coming from other parts of the world he did not anticipate a spike in shipments to Russia.

"We are exporting as normal to Russia at the moment. We are working as normal like before, it was always like this," said CEO Pavle Bajkovic.

"We supply to all over the place - England, Dubai, Denmark, Sweden. It might affect our EU customers but there's always been big demand. So it doesn't affect us."

Bajkovic said a more important issue for his company would be its ability to supply Russia with higher quantities if they were requested, and asserted prices were not substantially more attractive.

"The standard Russian demand is always frenzied before we start to pick every year. Okay, the price level has changed a bit, but not significantly," he said.

"Obviously they are bringing loads of goods from somewhere but I don't know where."

Bajkovic also explained the large supply gap left by Poland would not have a direct effect on him, as Apple World Doo supplied different areas of the market than many Polish exporters.

"We deal in premium apples so our market is very specific and very demanding - Polish apples didn't supply these kinds of supermarkets anyhow," he said.

"But the year is still young we'll see what's going to happen."

In contrast to Bajkovic, a spokesperson for fellow Serbian apple exporter ZZ Vocko said he had been receiving a large number of calls from Russian importers and he expected trade to see a huge increase.

"It will increase a lot, but the question is do we have enough goods for them? We have new buyers calling us and old customers also want more goods," said company director Marijan Davcik.

He added that he did not expect to export any apples to the rest of Europe for the coming season due to lower prices on the continent and higher prices in Russia.

"I think it will be like that for this year and for next year we will see. I think that Europe has more than enough apples, so there's no need to import apples from Serbia," Davcik said.

'No way' Serbia will become re-export hub

When asked whether Serbia may act as a re-export market for Polish apples, in light of recent speculation from Czech Fruit Growers' Association chairman Martin Ludvík, both exporters were emphatic in their responses.

"We cannot react, we have very strict rules," Bajkovic said.

"It's not going to happen. The influence of EU apples to the Serbian market is going to be significant because there's not going to be sales in the local market, so I suppose Polish apples are going to be sold here with very low margins.

"But in terms of us exporting them, there is no way."

He added that the people who had invested large amounts of money in his business would not want to deal with that kind of situation.

Davcik echoed Bajkovic's comments, agreeing that Polish apples could fill the void left in the Serbian market as more product is shipped abroad.

"I think more Serbian apples will be exported to Russia and maybe Polish apples will be imported for our domestic market for the supermarkets," Davcik said.

"We cannot re-export to Russia, we can only export our apples because the inspections are very strict."

To have a look through our wide-ranging coverage on Russia's import restrictions, click here.

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