With a luxury program schedule, a new version of ExpoCereza 2023 was held, an event organized by the municipality of Romeral. On September 29 and 30, the town's main square brought together producers, farmers, exporters, agricultural companies, among other attendees, around a series of exhibitions that addressed various subjects about the cherry industry.
Ignacio Caballero, deputy marketing manager of Asoex, participated in the opening of the seminar, giving a comprehensive talk on the importance of cherry exports, the main destination of this fruit species and promotional campaigns in China: «For us, it is very important to be at the base, to be where the fruit is, the production, this is our genesis, so we have to always be watching what is happening; it is also important to recognize and for people to see all the value that their work adds to the country, to see what their opportunities, needs, opportunities are. We believe that the chain has to be integrated, there has to be good communication about everything that is happening here, with everything that is being done outside, since in the end everything comes down to the fruit, the product, the land, everything we are doing. We believe that what Romeral is doing is very interesting, to position an emblematic product in a commune, in a very important region of our country and for people to be in contact with the land and with the products; It is ideal that more people can do it, that there is more diffusion so that people see the impact it has, we said it today, fruit is the second most important export product in Chile and cherry cherries are the main exported fruit product, so we believe that what is happening is very important and more visibility is needed.
Friday's session included presentations by Jéssica Rodríguez, a post-harvest specialist and co-founder of Trío Kimün.
«I was invited to make a presentation on important quality parameters for exporting cherries and we came here to make a contribution to this interesting, super interesting initiative.«.
«The specialist also referred to the repercussions that this unstable spring could have on the post-harvest of cherries: "There is a lot of uncertainty, because in reality one cannot generalize, it will depend on management, things that the producers have done; perhaps the only thing we can say or perhaps have more clarity in the post-harvest part is that we are going to have a wide range of colors at the time of harvest, because we are seeing very long and uneven blooms, so that will make us live with more colors on the day of harvest, hence the recommendation from now on is to be very careful, it is not convenient to harvest overripe fruit and perhaps we will lose fruit that is a little redder on the other hand, but it could be convenient if we have this unevenness on the day of harvest", Rodriguez concluded.
During the same day, Luis Devotto, pest control specialist from INIA Quilamapu, also spoke about the control of Drosophila suzukiiWalter Masman spoke about varietal replacement for the central region and Isabel Quiroz, Executive Director of iQonsulting, spoke about the international cherry market.
«I am happy to participate in an event organized by a municipality where there are very traditional cherry producers such as those from Romeral. There is a very traditional cherry culture here and I have always said that it is very important not only to market to the world, but also to the interior, to feel proud of what we have and part of my presentation highlighted the need we have for marketing, to begin to differentiate our cherries at different times. Romeral comes out at a stage where all the volume from Chile is there, therefore if we do not differentiate ourselves, but if we do not do special marketing before the Chinese New Year, Chinese New Year and post-Chinese New Year to differentiate that cherry, to differentiate our varieties as well, the truth is that we are losing the opportunity to achieve the highest value for our cherry in the market,» warned Quiroz.
Second day
Saturday, September 30th featured 4 interesting presentations by Richard Batías, PhD in Plant Physiology; Patricio Murúa, Technical Assistant of Abud y Cía; the advisor Álvaro Sepúlveda; and Carlos Tapia, Founder and Technical Director of Avium, an advisor specializing in cherry production, who spoke about current trends and updates in cherry management.
«My presentation had a lot of information about what is happening, what happened, what the characteristics of the season are, what all the dynamics of cold and heat accumulation mean that could be impacting production this year and the concern also about the dynamic evolution of temperatures this spring thinking about the «El Niño» phenomenon and what can happen in the post-harvest and in subsequent seasons, so we have to be prepared and look well in advance at the events that may occur, because they can be very basic for the crop and we have to be prepared for that», Tapia said.
The Mayor of Romeral, Carlos Vergara, for his part, made a positive assessment of the new version of the ExpoCereza Seminar.
«This is the third version of the ExpoCereza that we have developed here from the Romeral square, in the Romeral commune and talking about such important topics as innovation, such as the new challenges of the cherry; today the cherry has taken on a very large importance at a national level, we have cherry orchards from Ovalle to Chile Chico, today the cherry is the most exported fruit in our country, it is the third export at a national level, that is why we have proposed this great seminar from Romeral, working and thinking always in our farmers, not only of the commune of Romeral, but also of the province, the region and the country," concluded the mayor of Romeral.
