Direct exports of fresh and frozen products from Morocco to Germany reached unprecedented levels from January to March 2024, reports the EastFruit platform. This increase was particularly notable for exports of greenhouse tomatoes, peppers, frozen raspberries and fresh blueberries.
During the first three months of 2024, Morocco shipped nearly 35,000 tonnes of fresh and frozen vegetables, fruits and berries to the German market. This represents, according to EastFruit, an increase of 40% compared to the same period last year and double the average volume recorded over the last five years.
The platform also highlights that “the real impact of Morocco on the German fruit and vegetable market may be even more significant, given that a considerable part of Moroccan exports are re-exported via Spain or France, thus appearing in the statistics as Spanish exports or French”.
Direct deliveries of greenhouse tomatoes from Morocco to Germany for the January-March period this year almost doubled, reaching 13,000 tonnes, while exports of peppers increased by a third to 8,000 tonnes, EastFruit says. pointing out that “the greenhouse sector in the EU has faced a crisis due to rising energy costs, which has significantly increased the supply of greenhouse vegetables and increased the competitiveness of southern suppliers such as Morocco and Turkey”.
Also, Morocco significantly increased its exports of frozen raspberries to Germany during the specified period with figures for January-March 2024 reaching 1.7 thousand tonnes, more than four times the quantity of the previous year. It should be noted that the first quarter of this year was marked by a severe shortage of frozen raspberries on the German market, which led to a sharp increase in prices.
Furthermore, the supply of fresh Moroccan raspberries on the German market remained stable, at around 2.4 thousand tonnes. However, direct export of fresh blueberries grew, reaching 1.2 thousand tons, and sales of fresh strawberries doubled to 560 tons.
