Peru’s blueberry industry is poised for continued growth.
Terra Business manager, Federico Beltran Molina, said Peru currently has 14,000 hectares of blueberries which will grow to 20,000 in the next three years, as reported by Agraria.
He stressed that the blueberry producing companies are investing heavily in technology, resulting in Peru now having 10 genetic programs.
“Through the genetic component, Peru is achieving a differentiation by quality,” he said. “That quality stigma that the market put on us before (in 2012, 2013, 2014) when saying that Peruvian fruit was acidic and hit us a lot, is disappearing.”
Currently there are fields from Moquegua to Piura, with very active projects in the Sierra de Ancash (Huaraz) and Cajamarca. Of the 14,000 hectares of blueberries planted today, 5,000 are of the Biloxi variety, 5,000 are Ventura, 2,000 are from clubs of the 10 genetic programs mentioned, and another 2,000 are of protected varieties.
“That is why blueberries have become the most popular crop in Peru; that is the immense well-being that this product does to the country, since being very labor-intensive it generates thousands of jobs (between July and December about 25,000 to 30,000 people harvest blueberries daily in Trujillo), ” he said.
He explained that in Chavimochic there are already 8,000 hectares of blueberries, and in Olmos there are 3,500, but next year they will reach 5,000.
