The 2023 season ended in Northern Italy with a result close to 2.8 million

 OI Pomodoro Nord Italy announced on October 20 that the harvesting and processing season for industrial tomatoes in Northern Italy ended in recent days. The cultivated areas was 38,928 hectares, of which 3,731 ha under organic conditions and the remainder are integrated cultivation. Processed quantities were just under 2,800,000 tonnes of tomatoes, with exactly 2,798,312 tonnes, which is 12% less than what was negotiated between the industry and the Producer Organizations (PO).

The average agricultural yield for the territory of Northern Italy was 71.88 t/ha, lower than the average yield of the previous five years, equal to 73.93 t/ha. Specifically, the field yield of integrated production this year is in line with the average of the previous five-year period, while the organic field yield was 47.41 t/ha, significantly lower than the average yield of the previous five-year period of 62.87 t/ha.

On the territory, the campaign presented two very different faces: in the western area of Northern Italy the yields were very high, although some areas there were hardly hit by hail; while in the eastern area the yields were decidedly low due to the persistent rains in May, as well as the flood that hit the Ravenna area hard on May 20th, also leading to the loss of cultivated areas. "In summary – declares Tiberio Rabboni, President of OI Pomodoro da Industria Northern Italy – it was a campaign with fair, if not good, results in the western provinces and poor ones, unfortunately, in the eastern provinces, Ravenna and Ferrara in particular. The climate abnormality has also negatively affected the outcome of organic cultivation".

Although limited deliveries were expected for the weeks at the end of August, given the trend of transplants, which had been blocked for two weeks in the middle of May, the summer harvest season took place relatively regularly, with only one significant slowdown due to the rains at the end of August. Despite the adverse conditions during transplanting, the action of the farmers in the field and the scheduling of deliveries by the POs made it possible to govern the healthy development of the seedlings and the harvesting times, allowing regular deliveries for the entire processing period.

Furthermore, the prolonged stoppage of transplants in May meant that several tomato areas would be harvested in September and late October. Thanks to the good season, which throughout the month of September and into mid-October favored the ripening of a good product, the processing companies were willing to keep the factories open until the farmers completed the harvest, even if it was late.

Coordination between collection and processing was also possible thanks to continuous monitoring throughout the campaign, with a weekly meeting between PO and industry. The Northern Italian Industrial Pomodoro OI supported the parties with weekly reports on the quantity and quality of the tomatoes delivered and with the projection of production based on the distribution of transplants and the historical average yields.

May rains prevented the drought problem from weighing on crops, as has happened in previous years. “This should not make us lower our guard on this issue – says Rabboni -. The production industry must continue to dialogue with regional and national institutions and Consorzi di Bonifica to promote infrastructure works to manage water resources, in light of the effects of climate change".

The tomato delivered for processing this year has a very high quality, recording a Brix degree of 4.87, one of the highest values of the last decade. Given the excellent quality of the product delivered, the tomato was paid with a high payment index, among the highest in the last decade; the tomato already started from a base 100 reference price, equal to 150 euros per tonne, the highest ever recognized before by the industry to growers, to take into consideration the increase in agricultural production costs of the last year, to which is added the late payment premium and various business premiums paid by processing companies to tomato growers.

Sources: OI Pomodoro Nord