The 2021/22 Chilean Cherry Seasons Reaches an Export Volume of 356.4K tons

The 2021/22 Chilean cherry season reached an export volume of 356.4K tons, representing a 1.1% increase from the 2020/21 season and a 273.8% increase in the past five years since the 2016/17 season. One factor that did not allow the export volume to grow as the production volume only reached 71.3M 5kg boxes, which is below the initial projection at 74M 5kg boxes. The underperformance in production was caused by unfavorable weather and production issues, including a labor shortage.

Source: IQonsulting

The export window for Chilean cherries lasted nineteen weeks from W43 2021 and ended in W9 2022. In this period, the Chilean cherry industry faced many logistic challenges. Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, Chile faced container shortages, increased freight costs, port delays and closures, and increased inspections for fruit and vegetable exports. Over 95% of all Chilean cherry exports are transported by sea, so the logistic issues in ports impacted over 356K tons during the 2021/22 season. The delays caused by the logistic issues affected the quality of cherries since the longer transit time decreased the shelf life of cherries in the final destination.

During the 2021/22 season, the top cherry varieties produced in Chile were Lapins, Santina, and Regina. These three varieties represented over 78% of all Chilean cherry exports. Lapins is the variety with the largest production area in Chile, and during the 2021/22 season, the production of this variety dropped by 9% to 124K tons. On the other hand, the Santina variety increased its exports by 24%, reaching 85.1K tons, and the Regina variety exports increased by 19% to 66.9K tons. The top export destinations for Chilean cherries during the 2021/22 season were China and Hong Kong (314K tons), the United States (12.7K tons), South Korea (6.9K tons), Taiwan (6K tons), and the United Kingdom (3.3K tons).

Despite the 2021/22 season not showing exponential growth for the Chilean cherry industry, forecasts indicate that in the 2022/23 season, the production and exports of Chilean cherries will start to surge.