Pears from China Pt 2

From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson with today’s Fruit Grower Report. Processed Bartlett pears from the Northwest get to compete with a significant number of canned pears from China in recent years.

But, Washington State Fruit Commission president, BJ Thurlby says the pandemic actually helped out a bit with more folks stocking their shelves with canned goods …

THURLBY … “And with the phenomenon of pantry loading we really saw an uptick in retail sales of canned pears and so did all other canned food items. And while that has dropped back some since the pandemic has been officially declared over, it’s still happening.”

Thurlby says it’s not where it was, but …

THURLBY … “From where we were in 2019, sales of canned pears are still up at retail by about 6 to 7%. So, that’s kind of an interesting little take that’s hard for us to really quantify any positives that could have possibly come out of the pandemic, but that’s a little one that, you know, people started eating a few more canned food products. So, that’s something we’ll take, and we’ll try to continue to nurture that.”

The challenges, Thurlby says are manageable …

THURBLY … “The price is going up in terms of grower’s return per ton and China’s still out there. That’s a huge piece of the challenge that we face every year, but I would say that I honestly believe there’s more daylight and positive coming out of the process side of our industry right now than we’ve seen in a few years, so that’s good.”

The volume from pear imports China this year is up 30% … even with the 40% tariffs.