It’s the harvest season for mandarin oranges, but prices for this year’s fruit are relatively low, due to an unusually large amount of rotten fruit. As Joseph Kim now reports, analysts blame the situation on the wet weather we’ve been having.

[slug]
Garak-dong Agricultural Market, Seoul

It’s early in the morning but this market is already teeming with farmers who have gathered from all over the nation to put their harvested mandarins up for auction.

Commission merchants are busy looking inside the cardboard boxes to check the quality of the fruit.

[slug]
Spoiled fruit blamed on wet weather

There seem to be a few rotten mandarins due to the frequent rains last month.

At the end of the day, the average price auctioned for a 10-kilogram box of mandarin oranges was 10,700 won.


The price has continued to hover around the 10,000 won mark after hitting a low of 9,700 won on November 26th.


One of the main contributing factors to the drop in prices is said to be the relatively low quality of this year’s mandarins.

[slug]
Price drop also due to falling demand

Other reasons include the rise in number of other fruits like strawberries… and an overall drop in demand for mandarins.

Insiders say prices may even drop further unless the fruit quality improves.

INTERVIEW
Kim Jeong-bae / Auctioneer, Nonghyup Garak Agricultural Market
Due to the frequent rains, the mandarins are not as sweet as usual. The quality is not that high, some of it has gone bad. If weather conditions improve and the quality of the fruit improves, then there’s a chance prices could go up. Otherwise, there’s no chance...
<인터뷰 : 김정배/농협가락공판장 경매차장>
"잦은 비로 인해 당도와 품질이 떨어지고 부패과도 많이 나오고..
날씨가 좋아서 감귤이 축축하지 않고
마른 상태로 출하되면 (가격이)//
**수퍼체인지**
좋아질 여지는 있지만 이런 상태로 가면 시세가 좋을 수 없습니다."

[camera] Kim Seung-cheol

In an effort to bring prices back up, representatives from the provincial government Nonghyup Jeju branch visited the agricultural auctioning market in Garak-dong, Seoul… to ask people for their understanding about the current situation.

The recent ratification of the Korea-China Free Trade Agreement is also adding to the slump Jeju mandarin farms are experiencing.

[REPORTER]
Joseph Kim

So far 146,000 tons of Jeju mandarins have been distributed… which is 27 percent of the total harvested amount. Mandarin farmers are urgently calling for more effort to be made to bring the market prices back up for the rest of their produce.

Joseph Kim KCTV