Just days out from the conclusion of the 2014 campaign, the Peruvian Citrus Growers' Association (ProCitrus) has announced 106,200 metric tons (MT) of fruit have been shipped to date.

The group's general manager Sergio del Castillo told www.freshfruitportal.com the figure was within initial expectations, although a later estimate.

"At the start of the season we had estimated a growth of 10% in exports, however, as the campaign continued this growth expectation rose a little due to the amount of fruit that was seen in the harvests," Del Castillo said.

He said this prompted an April estimate of 15-20% growth for the season, however the season then adopted a slower pace.

"If we look at the figures, we will surely close with between 12-15% growth and not the 20% we hoped for as the fruit packout was not as expected. However, we stay within the ranges we had estimated at the start," he said.

He said easy peelers stayed dominant representing 90% of the Peruvian citrus export crop, while the order of destination markets was also maintained.

"The United Kingdom is our main destination, followed by the Netherlands which is the point of entry for all of northern and eastern Europe.

"In third place we have the U.S. with close to 20% of exports and Canada in fourth place.

"After them we have other countries whose volumes don't exceed 3% and these four destinations I mentioned represent more than 80% of Peruvian citrus exports."

When asked possible effects from the Russian ban, Del Castillo said no impact had really been felt as the measures were introduced at the end of the campaign.

"We will participate in World Food Moscow - which will go over the next few days - and well, we have the expectation of getting a lot of interest from Russian importers with the view of providing fruit to them for the next season."

He said there were positive hopes for the 2015 expectations, but it was still far too early to guess figures.

"For now the only thing I can bring forward is that flowering in early varieties has come with a good load, and it is estimated that we will have a similar production to what we had this year.

"It's a significant production level. The early varieties have had at least 15% more production compared to 2013, but it is still too early to say it will be the same volume...but, according to flowering, the campaign is coming normally with similar volumes to 2014.

"In the cast of the late varieties, it is too early to bring something forward, as there are many of them that recently have been finishing up being harvested," he said, adding there would be a clearer picture for these cultivars come November."

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