Bad weather conditions in the first half of April with low temperatures, frost, fog, rain and ice caused enormous damage to fruit growers in the Republic of Srpska.
The pear suffered the most, which, according to fruit growers, will not even have a crop this year, followed by apricot, cherry and plum… The only fruit that survived the weather tsunami was the apple.
According to fruit growers, the crop will be cut in half this year due to bad weather conditions. Dragoja Dojčinović, president of the Association of Fruit Growers of the RS, says that a temperature of around 12 degrees favors pears in flower, so the early varieties are destroyed.
“Cherry and apricot also suffered. The problem is that the frost appeared in the most sensitive phase of fruit development, and the temperature dropped to -5. It is bad for fruit even when the temperature is zero, let alone in the minus.“, pointed out Dojčinović.
Cherries and plums, whose crop will fail compared to last year, also fared badly, he adds.
According to him, the bad weather conditions that hit Serbia will force fruit growers to give up that branch of agriculture, because it is simply not worth growing fruit in such conditions.
“In Srpska, we have seen a 50 percent drop in the number of fruit growers in the last three years. Although the premiums for supporting fruit growers have been doubled, unfortunately, we do not have the production for those premiums“, points out Dojčinović.
Stojan Marinković, president of the Association of Agricultural Producers of the RS, says that due to bad weather conditions in April and low temperatures, crops in the growth phase, such as wheat, barley, oilseed rape, are also being targeted.
“When it comes to the spring sowing of corn, sunflower, soybeans, it could be postponed due to bad weather conditions. There has been a cooling of the sowing layer, higher temperatures must be waited for the soil to warm up, which would contribute to rapid seed germination.“, explains Marinković.
Imports are six times higher
according to official data of the Foreign Trade Chamber of BiH, 179.4 million kilograms of fruit were imported last year, worth 230.3 million KM. For the same period, 30.9 million kilograms of fruit were exported from Bosnia and Herzegovina, worth 119.4 million KM. When looking at the quantity, Bosnia and Herzegovina imported six times more fruit than it exported.