New fresh fruit and vegetables China report

Reportlinker.com has added a new market research report entitled Fresh fruit & vegetables in China 2009: A market analysis to its offering.

The reports has found China’s total retail fresh fruit and vegetables market to grow by 144.9% between 2002 and 2008 to reach a total value of RMB236.69 billion ($34.68 billion) in current terms.

This compares with a total population growth of 6.36% over the same period, meaning that per capita spending on fruits and vegetables in constant 2001 prices has increased significantly.

Per capita retail sales during the 2001 to 2008 period increased by 116.45%, from RMB142.7 in 2008 ($20.9).

Robust economic growth and a subsequent climb in consumer incomes have created greater demand for more and better-quality food products, or at least food that is not tainted with harmful additives, which has meant certifiably clean produce can demand higher prices.

As a consequence, sales of fruit and vegetables have remained stable within total retail food sales, in volume terms, thanks to prices remaining strong while demand has also risen.

Retailers such as Carrefour and Wal-Mart have been investing a lot of time in working with farmer-suppliers to overcome these problems, improve production methods, rid the production cycle of contaminants, support viable cooperatives that can manage land, grow crops and supply quality produce more efficiently.