COAG Murcia, against the great wineries for ruining the price of grapes
COAG Murcia has lambasted the pricing policy being made in their region by the largest wine groups, considering that doesn’t value the work of farmers, whose grapes are bought well below their production costs. The agricultural organization denounces this practice through large wineries come to mark their low prices for the rest of the sector, as happened last season, which was paid by the Monastrell grape of this region € 0.23 /Kilo.
From COAG Murcia unfairness in which incurred large wine groups that dominate purchases of grapes in the Region of Murcia, based in the same, by violating the Murcian farmer less favorably than other regions treatment also complaint. Specifically, the fact that for Castilla la Mancha and other communities paid for wines comparable to those of Appellations of Origin of Murcia prices much higher, ranging between 0.45 € / kilo and 0.60 criticized qualities € / kilo, doubling and almost tripling what you pay to Murcia farmers.
This approach by the large wineries could be capable of constituting a behavior infringes competition law by exploiting its dominant position
For this organization is not held the downward trend imposed by the large wine groups in the price paid by the grape origin nor the disparity in it between different producing areas, especially if several issues are taken into account. On the one hand, the fact that the yields per hectare in Manchego community due to widespread irrigation with important contributions of water, are infinitely superior to those obtained in Murcia, especially in the dry lands that despite their low yields, are distinguished by their great quality, without discussion in the global wine sector.
Furthermore, this low-price policy collides with a significant drop in supply, as evidenced conditions of the markets marked by a fall in stocks of wine and wine cellars and cooperatives, a reduction in production vineyard the lack of rain and the high cost of irrigation, a decrease of 15% recorded in the grape harvest in the Southern Hemisphere (representing 8 million hectoliters less than last season), a campaign in Europe that in the best cases, be described as “average”, due to declines in production and climatic and phytosanitary problems in several countries, as well as an upward trend in volumes and export prices.
COAG regrets that the incomprehensible position of the large wineries leads inexorably to ruin the regional sector production
This organization warns that the farmer will not be able to withstand for much longer “these prices insultingly low for its grapes, well below their production costs which Research Institute and Agricultural Development and Food of Murcia (IMIDA) has established, according to recently updated surveys, around 41 cents/kg “.
The seriousness of this situation is increased even more if possible, by the fact that these large groups are marking the price of grapes for the remaining wineries of the DO, arguing the need competition in the markets. And without, in most occasions, differences in the quality of the grapes are valued for fixing the price received by the farmer, according to logic.
Source: COAG Murcia
