Tariff|In addition to mild wines, mild orange juices have also arrived on store shelves. The crisis in orange farming has forced juice manufacturers to dilute orange juices to keep prices moderate.
Last the years have been unlucky for orange juice, a standard drink on many breakfast tables.
The production of oranges has been hampered by early yellowing disease and extreme weather events in major producing countries in the United States and Brazil.
The challenges of production have been seen on store shelves as a clear rise in orange juice prices.
In response to the rise in prices, manufacturers have started to put adulterated versions of orange juice on store shelves, with a lower content of full juice.
“The price situation of the raw material for orange juice has led to the fact that new types of products have become available for sale. Diluted orange juice and products that have been combined with, for example, mandarin juice,” says the sales manager of S-Group’s convenience store Juhani Haara.
Haara says that the sale of orange juices in the S group’s stores has decreased by 17 percent since the beginning of the year, while the sale of juices as a whole has decreased by a couple of percent.
The sale of orange juices has shifted to other fruit juices, especially apple juices, says Haara.
At least Eckes-Granini, which manufactures Brazil orange juice, and Valio, which produces Hedelmätarha orange juice, have introduced alternatives with a lower juice content, which resemble juice in their packaging.
Also Yle reported earlier this week from the appearance of diluted orange juices in store selections.
Kesko told Yle that diluted juices have entered their selection alongside full juices.
Orange juice the background of the price increase is drought and floods in Brazil, the world’s largest orange-producing country, and hurricanes in another important producing country, the United States. A common problem for farmers is that citrus fruits have been hit yellowing disease.
The disease originating in Asia is also called HLB disease (huanglongbing). It is a bacterial disease that prevents, among other things, the transport of nutrients in the tree. As a result, the leaves of the tree begin to turn yellow.
As a result of the bacterial disease, the fruits remain raw and their juice bitter, and eventually the tree dies. The disease is spread from one tree to another by the Diaphorina citri insect.
Hope for the situation has been created by an antibiotic called oxytetracycline, which has given promising results in the fight against the disease when sprayed on the trunk of orange trees.
Upward pressure on prices is also created by the reform of the soft drink tax, which will increase the taxation of drinks containing a lot of sugar, regardless of whether the sugar in the drinks is natural or added. The tax reform still needs the approval of the European Commission
In the price there will be strong upward pressure in the future, as research institute Fundecitrus, which focuses on citrus fruits, estimated at the beginning of May that the news agency According to Reutersthat in the 2024–2025 season, Brazil’s orange production will be at its lowest level in more than 30 years.
President of the International Fruit and Vegetable Juice Association (IFU). Kees Cools appointed of the Financial Times in the interview, the situation was really bad.
“This is a crisis. We’ve never seen anything like this before, even during long periods of frost or hurricanes,” Cools told the FT.
#Prices #orange #juice #taste #thinner #sharp #rise #prices #brought #adulterated #juices #stores
