Chile Cherry Sales to China Disappoint on Oversupply, Demand Lag

Chile notched a second disappointing season of cherry sales in China after exporting too much fruit too far ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday when consumption traditionally peaks.

Weather conditions brought Chile’s harvest forward by about 10 days, concentrating a larger volume of fruit in the early weeks of shipments, the cherry committee of trade association Frutas de Chile said in a preliminary assessment Monday. At the same time, a later Chinese New Year pushed demand farther out into the sales season. The group didn’t release revenue data.