A production of between 5.2 and 5.4 million tons for the tomato processing campaign started a few days in advance. The National Association of Vegetable Food Preserves Industrials (Anicav) reports that in Italy there has been a reduction in the area cultivated with tomatoes by 8.5% compared to the record year 2021. A total of 65,180 hectares have been cultivated, of of which 37,024 in the North Basin (-4.1% compared to the last campaign) and 28,156 in the Central South Basin (- 13.6% on 2021).
Drought and high temperatures reduce the yield
According to Anicav, the 2022 tomato transformation campaign presents “some more concerns in a particular scenario in which the premature ripening of the fruits resulting from the high temperatures of the past few weeks are combined”. The association underlines that in an uncertain economic context, many unknowns must already be taken into account at this beginning of the campaign, such as “the drought, particularly in the Northern basin, the difficulty in finding seasonal labor, both in the fields and in industry, the exponential increase in the costs of raw materials, primary and secondary packaging and above all energy resources and the growing risk of dangerous speculation ».
Record increases
«The increases – comments Marco Serafini, president of Anicav – which have reached unprecedented levels not only in terms of quantity but above all for the generality of the cost elements involved, have caused production costs to rise enormously. The sector will be put to the test, but we remain confident trusting in the resilience capacity of our entrepreneurs who will try, at least in part, to mitigate the consequences of these increases by affecting their margins “.
It is also difficult to find manpower
«The transformation campaign – declares Giovanni De Angelis, general manager of Anicav – starts among many unknowns, drought, climatic conditions, difficulties in finding labor and in a complex macroeconomic framework. We are even more worried about the speculative attitude of a part of the agricultural world, already revealed in this start of the campaign ».