Price of Christmas turron to rise

PALMA
THE price of Turron (the honey and almond nougat eaten mainly at Christmas) will rise by around two or three percent this Christmas due to the almond harvest, the rise in transport costs and packaging costs, according to Jose Enrique Garrigos.

Garrigos is head of the IGP (Protected Geographical Indicator) Regulating Council for Turron from Jijona and Alicante, the most famous in Spain.
The rules of the IGP de Jijona and Alicante specify the use of the almond varieties valenciana, mallorca, marcona, mollar and planeta as a basic ingredient, and they need to use a minimum ratio of 42 percent of almonds for the Alicante Turron and 52 percent for the Jijona Turron.

The increase in prices will be similar to that of last year, around two to three per cent, while in 2005 there was a rise of seven per cent due to the bad almond harvest.

Garrigos underlined that the increase in the price of turron can also be explained by the 10 per cent rise in the cost of transport and a rise of three per cent in the cost of the packaging used.

The National Committee for Nuts said last month that the almond harvest had been “irregular” and that production was down by 33 per cent to 36'445 tons compared with the 54'465 tons of last year.

The problems with disease in some areas, and frost and abundant rain in others has caused great losses during the last few months, according to the Committee.

Nevertheless, Garrigos said that these figures are still estimates and that he did not think that there were any serious problems, as the sector has a surplus from last year. “Even if there is a big drop in the harvest, it will not affect the turron sector much”, said the President of the IGP, who added that “we are buying almonds at the same price as last year”.

For his part, the director general of Almendrave (the Spanish Federation of Almond and Hazelnut Exporters), Domingo Roman, said that although there had been a decrease in the production of almonds in certain areas, the forecast for exports was similar to that of the last few years.

He recalled that during the last few years the price of almonds had been “slightly higher than normal” but added that it was necessary to wait until the end of the period before giving any exact details.

In 2006 a total of 8'031 tons of turron was manufactured in Spain, which is around the record levels seen in the years 2000 to 2003.
The total turnover for turron manufactured by the 22 companies belonging to the Regulation Council of the IGP of Jijona and Alicante was 68 million euros.

Earlier this year, Majorcan farmers were complaining of a poor almond harvest and the low price their crop was fetching.
They claim they had been hit hard by imports of Californian almonds, which are larger than most Majorcan varieties but which are not as sweet and do not have as much oil.

However, many of the trees in Majorca are old and are not being replaced.