“The “Profitable Citrus” campaign has produced results"

Juan Safont and José María Planells

Both José María Planells, the association’s General Manager and Juan Safont, its President, declared, “after several very negative seasons, citrus growers experienced a substantial improvement in their prices which in general amounted to a 33% increase in earnings compared to the previous year.”

If the current citrus season keeps in line with crop forecasts, which are very favourable for the Spanish crop, and there are no other problems, the cooperative hopes that once more returns for their associates will grow by 5% and “citrus growing will become a profitable profession” in the words of Anecoop’s President, Juan Safont.

Planells added, “we are trying to ensure that the good forecasts for this season translate into real benefits for all the links in the food chain with positive prices for the growers”.

The global balance for last year, finalised in September, has yielded some good results for the Valencian company which had a global turnover of 451 million Euros representing a 5% increase.

Current forecasts for the crop within Anecoop are very positive: in citrus 350,000, in other fruit 170,000 and 130,000 in vegetables.

The “Profitable Citrus” campaign has produced results and the current campaign focuses on the following aspects: planning and agreeing on the seasonal calendar, strengthening sales structures in Poland and Prague, specialising warehouses for the different citrus categories, collaborating with national and international retail and investing in the Russian market.

Currently Anecoop is the leading company in fruit and vegetable sales in Spain. It has more than 175,000 associates and brings together 96 cooperatives from across the country.