Here’s the latest update on last week´s cheery, bilingual posts on Chile-China cherry trade. It reads like a textbook case study in supply and demand, as well as a cautionary tale about the risks inherent in agriculture, exports, perishables, and trends in general.
From today’s El Mercurio: (translation and emphasis mine)
Oversupply of domestic exports to China cherries causes 50% drop in prices
Friday, January 27, 2012
Economy and Business
Miguel Concha M.
The rush for the fruit to land in China before the New Year holiday caused a collapse of the ports and sales systems of the Asian country. The price of Chilean cherries in China dropped by 50% in the past few days.
As explains Manuel Jose Alcaino, president of Decofrut, from January 23 fruit values were reduced from an average of U.S. $ 30 FOB per carton to U.S. $ 15 FOB.
The reason for the drastic fall is in response to an oversupply of cherries during the week before the Chinese New Year celebration, when by tradition many give gifts of fruit.
“We tried to get almost all the fruit to arrive before the celebration, which begins on January 23 and lasts for about a week. This stretched the country’s logistics system, making it collapse and causing a strong demand overload in a week, “said Alcaino.
The specialist added that a large proportion of the Chilean cherry sales in the Asian giant occur around Chinese New Year. In 2012 that date was earlier than in previous years, based on the location of the moon, so Chilean companies increased their efforts to make the cherries arrive in time for the celebration.
This resulted in three boats filled with about 700 containers, which together totaled about 14,000 tons of fruit.
“There were blocks and blocks of fruit trucks trying to enter the city through the port of Guangzhou. In addition, the market itself was also a mess because the volumes had exceeded sales opportunities in the city,” says Decofrut president.
The problem faced by exporters in the world’s second largest economy is not small, when you consider that is the main market for cherries. In fact, Asia accounts for about 60% of total shipments of the fruit.
Moreover, in recent years, exports of Chilean cherries to China had experienced a real boom: growth of 91%. Prices hit more than U.S. $ 40 FOB per box.
According to data from the Fruit Exporters Association (Asoex) in the 2010-2011 season a total of 7211 tons of cherries arrived in China , versus 3772 tons in 2009-2010.
Alcaino adds that part of the reason for the haste why this large amount was sent, was in response to the high expectations they had for exporters this year, based on the strong growth in previous years.
Students at work! Photo courtesy of Fundación EcoScience
Do you remember doing hands-on science experiments?
When I was a sophomore in high school, for a chemistry project, I studied baking. I decided to research the chemical properties of flour, sugar, eggs, butter, baking powder vs. baking soda, etc. I then ignored printed recipes and attempted to create tasty treats. The first few were far from delicious: a cake chock-full of chalky cocoa powder, concave lemon cupcakes, a mushy cake with too much mint extract. Eventually, by cake number 25 or so, I had created two real recipes: mint chocolate chip cake and apricot muffins.
Why am I telling you this?
Because it’s one of the few school lessons that I can remember in detail.
Why do I remember that baking soda is a base, and it needs to be combined with acidic ingredients like lemon or buttermilk or cream of tartar in order to produce the carbon dioxide bubbles that enable the cake to rise?
Because I didn’t just read this in a book; I discovered it with my own hands and nose and tastebuds.
I believe that hands-on science education is absolutely critical for the next generation of citizens, everywhere in the world. One must have a fundamental understanding of ecology, biology, and other disciplines to be able to make good decisions about food, transportation, and the world in general, but students will only truly remember those lessons if they discover them with their own hands!
My friend María Cuellar is developing a fabulous science education project here in Chile. It’s a bus specially equipped with science experiments, and it will travel to underprivileged schools throughout the country, to reach 10,000 kids per year. I love the name: Con = with, Ciencia = science, and ConCiencia sounds the same as conscience.
María’s enthusiasm is contagious; here’s her description of the project.
Dear friends,
I’ve told you a little bit about this before, but I’ll explain it again briefly. I am part of a group of scientists and entrepreneurs working on a project called el Bus ConCiencia, a mobile laboratory on a bus that will take scientific experiments to the most remote and impoverished schools in Chile.
Although we have enough funding for the investment part of the project (i.e. the bus, the laboratory modification, the development of the experiments), we still need to find funding for the operational costs for 2012 (i.e. gasoline, materials for experiments, teacher trainings, printing costs, etc.). So, we launched the Bus ConCiencia fundraising campaign! It’s on a lovely Argentinean website called idea.me: http://idea.me/
proyecto/89/busconciencia What we want to achieve with the website is crowdfunding. This means that we are interested in having lots of donations, even if they are small. So, if you want to donate 20 or 5 dollars, that’s really helpful!
Here are the instructions, just in case:
1. You go to this website: http://idea.me/proyecto/89/busconciencia?siteLang=en_US
2. Click on the green button that says “I WANT TO SUPPORT!”
3. Go down and click on your “Reward”, that is, how much you want to donate.
4. Choose whether you want to pay for the shipping cost (for us to mail your reward).
5. Go down and click on “CONTINUE”.
6. Write down your information for ideame (this is what we will use to send you your rewards).
7. Click on “I have read and accept the ideame terms and conditions.” Then “SAVE”.
8. Choose your payment method (I highly recommend PayPal).
9. Write down your information and pay with a credit card.Please share this link with your friends!
Thank you!!
xoxo,
Maria
Yesterday I tweeted:
So far this link has been shared, retweeted, and favorite’d 15 times, which is a lot more than most of the links, pictures, and observations I share on Twitter.
Why this tweet? I have some ideas.
1) Clear Audience. I addressed this tweet towards China-philes. This is a relatively broad, inclusive, and self-defined category, and there are a lot of China-philes on Twitter.
2) Specific Keywords. A grad student friend once referred to Harvard as the H-bomb. This name catches people’s attention!
3) Immediate Benefit. The course is available online. It’s free. A Harvard education for anyone with an internet connection and the attention span to sit through a lecture (or 37!)
What do you think? When do you find that your tweets get a lot of attention?
We asked women aged 13-70, from the Casa de la Mujer Huamachucho´s Escuela de Verano, about their motivations for entrepreneurial endeavors. This is what they said.
With several Start-Up Chile entrepreneurs, I am leading a five-day seminar at Casa de la Mujer Huamachuco, a community center in one of the poorest areas of Santiago, in the comuna of Renca. Soon I will write more about this experience.
For now, here is a translation of the list scribbled above:
Motivations for Entrepreneurial Activity (emprender is the verb form of “start something, as an entrepreneur.” Perhaps the best translation is “bootstrap.” If you have a better translation, let me know!)
- occupy free time
- generate resources
- grow more
- feel more useful — don´t depend on husband
- feel good about yourself at any age
- surge in life, be something
- be independent, own schedule
- teach values to the children
- develop as a person
- have your own money
What a list! What else would you add?
To celebrate the Year of the Dragon, I am trying something new: posting about trade with China in both English and Spanish. The English version of this article is here.
via Wikipedia
Esta semana es el año nuevo chino. Feliz año del dragón!
Nos ofrece la oportunidad de destacar un ejemplo exitoso del comercio chino-chileno: la exportación de las cerezas chilenas para este feriado importante.
Roja, dulce y empacada en cajas de regalo. Las guindas chilenas son consideradas como algo especial en el año nuevo chino. El eje principal de las exportaciones desde Chile a China ocurre durante este feriado.
De acuerdo a los reportes de Portal Fruticola:
El próximo 23 de enero se celebrará el Año Nuevo Chino (ANC) fecha durante la cual no se puede descuidar ningún detalle, siendo uno de los más significativos la fruta y en especial, las cerezas.
“Las cerezas se han logrado posicionar como un elemento característico del ANC y especialmente en las grandes ciudades donde las cerezas son consideradas como un producto de lujo: es un producto importado, por lo que da una aire de exclusividad a quien lo compra y consume; es caro y escaso porque se puede encontrar sólo en esta época. Por último, el color rojo de esta fruta influye ya que todos los adornos van en rojo y dorado. Estos factores producen que se genere una alta demanda y la gente esté dispuesta a pagar muy buenos precios, que es lo importante para los exportadores”, explica Arturo Aranda, country manager de “The Foodlinks” en Shanghai.
Este año nuevo chino será dos semanas antes que el año pasado, lo que es un desafío para los exportadores, lo que significa que el periodo de cultivo también tendrá que ser antes. Tres flotas especiales fueron enviadas a finales de diciembre y llegaron a China aproximadamente entre el 16 y 18 de enero.
De acuerdo a Bernard Wu, el supervisor commercial de la importadora Zhxing Runfeng Food en Guangzhou, “las cerezas chilenas son bien evaluadas por los consumidores chinos principalmente por su calidad, delicioso sabor y buena presentación”.
The FoodLinks, una empresa que conecta a los proveedores chilenos con compradores chinos, plantea que sólo un 3% de los alimentos chilenos exportados son enviados a China y solamente un 0.7% de la comida importada a China viene desde Chile. Esto significa que hay un enorme potencial de crecimiento que sólo requiere un cuidadoso alineamiento entre lo que los consumidores chinos quieren y lo que los agricultores chilenos pueden ofrecerles.
Feliz Año del Dragón!!
I'm Leslie and I connect entrepreneurs in Chile, China, California, and beyond — especially through translation, training, and trade. More about me.
