Crazy fruit prices may put buyers off for good

    PIA AKERMAN
    The Australian
    January 04, 2014


CONSUMERS are paying more at the greengrocer for their favourite summer fruits, after supplies of avocados, stone fruits and mangoes failed to meet strong holiday season demand.      

For avocado growers, it has been a lean year with reduced crops around the country but particularly in southwest Western Australia, where most of the domestic summer supply is sourced.

Avocados Australia chief executive John Tyas said he had seen prices for single avocados exceed $5 at retail outlets, creating serious risks that customers would stop buying the fruit, triggering memories of problems faced by the banana industry in the wake of Cyclone Yasi.    

"You turn consumers off and then it takes a long time to get those people back in the habit of eating avocados again," Mr Tyas said.      

"We want consumers to be able to buy a good-value crop year round, but because demand seems to be increasing each year, it pushes that gap and takes the prices up to levels that we don't like seeing."

Supplies of much-loved summer mangoes are down after a reduced crop across the Northern Territory and the Kimberley, leaving Queensland to pick up the slack.

Australian Mango Industry Association chief executive Trevor Dunmall said there was no clear explanation for why the northwest areas had suffered, particularly in the Kimberley where some producers are struggling to find any fruit on their trees.

"Mangoes are a little bit of law unto themselves," Mr Dunmall said. "For a lot of growers in the north, it's been a tough year."

A mild winter and spring have also reduced peach and nectarine numbers, pushing prices up to levels not seen for the past few years.

Forecasts for the coming year are more optimistic, particularly among avocado growers who plan to plant more trees as they expand into foreign markets.

Brothers Stewart and Mitchell Ipsen intend to plant more than 20,000 trees on their avocado farms near Manjimup, 300km south of Perth.

Stewart Ipsen said they were hoping to grow market sales in Southeast Asia and parts of the Middle East ahead of tightening competition at home.

"We've been trying to steadily increase our markets and the volume that's leaving our shores because a lot of trees are being planted and the forecasts are that things will get tougher in Australia," he said.

"The price of avocados will fall here, it has to. With prices at $3 (per avocado) or above, there is definite resistance and sales will fall away pretty fast."

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But it isn't clear from the article as to whether or not the rising prices are due to retailers increasing their margins or just to the laws of supply and demand.

If you ever worry about the price of fruit, try comparing it with what people pay for confectionary, fruit is still cheap

Not so long ago there had been no farm gate price rise for fruit in 10 years while the retail price had gone up 600%

What ever the problem is you cant really blame farmers for undersupply, they simply could not afford to grow fruit.

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I would never pay $5 an Avocado...... & by rights these fruit should never be any higher than $1. They are consistently the most inconsistent quality of fruit to purchase.

It's like Russian Roullette ... a real gamble buying Avos.

If you bought half a dozen you would be lucky to score 2 or 3 out of 6 that were fully usable/edible.

They are either green or left over ripe & inedible off the shelf. And regardless of how well you monitor them to what you think is optimal ripeness ... they are often full of brown/black hard spots & stringy.

This is not an acceptable product to warrant such prices. If consumers complained about all the issues with retailing Avacados then they wouldn't be worth growing because the complaints would be many, but people(Aussies) don't ... so the poor retail presentation continues.

Gnads wrote on Jan 4^th, 2014 at 12:41pm:


You must be getting them from a rather dodgy outlet if that's the case.  There is an occasional one that isn't as good as expected but, out of half a dozen, I would expect to find at least five of them to be OK.

Regardless of how good they were, I wouldn't pay more than $3 for one though.

Frances wrote on Jan 4^th, 2014 at 6:59am:

I agree here. Supply is reduced, so prices will increase to constrain demand.

The prices dont put ppl off as we saw with bananas. Since they can get away with it they will do it.

Also why buy crap just because its cheap?

SOB

Frances they haven't been $5 ...... but not long back they were very close ..... $4.98 is close enough for me. At that price they stayed on the shelf for mine.

The Avos I have been buying were Woolies @ $2.98 .... & at that price I expect a premium product.

It's not....... usually buy 4 or 6 .... they look OK ..... & I'm very picky with selection but consistently they are full of black & brown spots & stringy...... no matter how well they are judged/timed for ripeness.