From the very beginning, the Canary tomato sector has been one of the Spanish productive sectors most affected by Brexit. If the attempts to redirect the community aid for marketing and transport are unsuccessful, producers in the Archipelago will no longer have access to these compensations, resulting in the loss of 0.174 Euro per kilo exported to Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as reported by the Council of Economy of the Canary Government, Carolina Darias. This would cause a financial damage of almost 3.5 million Euro per year, if we take into account the volume of tomatoes exported last year to the United Kingdom (the main market for Canary tomatoes).
According to the figures of the former Institute of Foreign Trade, now called Spain Export and Investments (ICEX), the Canary Islands exported 20.13 million kilos of tomatoes to the United Kingdom in 2018, while in the first seven months of 2019 exports amounted to 12.7 million kilos.
To try preventing the worst forecasts from coming true, the Canary Government has launched a strategy aimed at reformulating the lines of aid with which the European Union compensates Canary companies for the extra cost of shipping the product to the United Kingdom.
What the regional Executive has proposed is for a part of the marketing aid that Canary tomato growers receive as part of the Posei to be reoriented to production aid, which is also part of the program managed by the European Commission. We are talking about two million Euro.
Another point in this strategy is the attempt of the Canary and Spanish governments to use the status of the Archipelago as an outermost region (RUP) to persuade the EU authorities to maintain the state aid for the transport of tomatoes, which in the case of the shipments made to the United Kingdom amount to around 1.9 million Euro.
Source: eldia.es