Reader’s Digest – February 2023

In February 2023, we published the following articles:

• Global Exports of Tomato Paste, updated February1, 2023.
• A report published last December by ISMEA confirms Italy's leading roleg, as the 3^rd largest producer of processing tomatoes (about 15% of the global production).
• The Indian company Cremica has established itself as a leader in the food processing business, selling to food giants in India, and is expecting a growth of about 23-35% in the next few years.
• In California, thanks to recent winter storms, water allocation is now up to 30% (from the initial 5% announced in December).
• The Parma-based FBR-ELPO company celebrated its 60 years anniversary and is planning on continuing its expansion for the next sixty years.
• Prices of Canned Tomatoes, February 2023: Italy, Spain, USA, Greece, Portugal.
• The Italian brand Pomi went through a complete rebranding to celebrate its 40 years, with a new logo, new packaging and a renewed design system.
• The Italian Mutti company has announced it will soon increase the capacity of the Montechiarugolo plant by 74%.
• The Italian association Centromarca, led by Franceso Mutti, highlighted the critical problems faced by the consumer goods industry in a recent press conference, and is hoping for a discussion with the government and modern distribution companies.
• Auctioneers Rabin Worldwide will conduct a public auction the for former Olam tomato plant in Lemoore, California.
• In China, 2022 exports are up 24% against 2021, and 7% higher than the three-year period pre-pandemic.
• Salicrop, an Israeli seed company, developed a seed enhancement technology that helps to address the climate change challenges impacting plant growth and development, by improving plant resiliency and preventing significant losses in crop productivity.
• The Dodici Morelli plant , former OPOE production site, has been sold to the Conserve Italia cooperative group, after a two-year lease to ensure business continuity.
• In Argentina, extreme heat and hail have affected plant yields in some regions. However, the demand is persistent, the acreage has increased and new processing plants have opened.
• Global Imports of Tomato Products, updated 16 February 2023.
• In Spain, growers and processors agreed on a price of 150 Euros per (metric) tonne for the coming season in Extremadura. Planted surfaces are up to about 20,000 hectares.
• Scientists from the University of California, Davis, published the results of a study in Earth's Future. They investigated agrivoltaic systems, growing tomatoes under the shade of solar panels, and found out that the red part of the spectrum is better for growing plants, and the blue part for solar production.
• Kraft Heinz Co. is launching an Innovation Challenge in collaboration with the organizers of the Future Food-Tech event series. They are looking for startups developing solutions to improve the taste, nutrition and sustainability of tomatoes.
• Tomato Paste Prices, February 2023: USA, Spain, Portugal, Italy, China, Chile.
• WPTC 2023 preliminary crop forecast established at 41.8 million tonnes.
• The EU carbon price hit 100 euros per tonne for the first time in February. An academic study found that it drove a 4% reduction in European emissions between 2008 and 2016.
• For the top 10 countries of the sector, in terms of exports of tomato paste, the marketing year was 2.8% lower in volume than 2021, but up compared to the pre-pandemic period.
• ANICAV, in collaboration with Isi Sementi, Rina and Xeda, organized a webinar to present the results of the survey on organic tomato processing in Italy, on the 2^nd March 2023.
• Worldwide tomato production in 2021 is up 2% from 2020, but production for raw consumption has a better growth rate than production for processing.
• Within the CAP strategic plan, Italy has chosen to allocate funds to coupled support, as was used previously in Spain, Portugal, France and Greece.
• A new research led by the University of Portsmouth suggest that groups of spiders can be used as an environmentally-friendly way to protect crops against agricultural pests such as Tuta absoluta, the tomato leafminer moth.
• Water allocation in California is now up to 35%, which is good news for tomato growers.

You can find the individual articles in the NEWS list and/or search by keyword, date etc.