Season analysis
The 24/25 berry campaign has been characterized by a very difficult agronomic situation, especially for strawberries, due to the heavy rains that severely affected the fruit's quality and led to a significant number of complaints at the destination. Despite this, onubafruit has obtained positive results, continuing the sustained growth rate that it has maintained since its creation, as indicated Carlos Esteve, its commercial director, in his presentation. Thus, this campaign, sales growth was 7,4% compared to the previous one, reaching €290 million. In the case of strawberries, he explained that it is significant that, over the years, the product's value has increased. There are two main varieties that represent 60% of their supply: Marimbella from Nova Siri and Rociera from FNM. "Our cooperatives grow because our farmers grow," he stated. Francisco Sánchez, manager of Onubafruit.

Sánchez emphasized that one of the campaign's successes has been the results obtained with the company's new blueberry varieties, which have allowed them to avoid production peaks and advance the campaign with a high-quality and productive product, thus improving average prices. "We're one step ahead of the competition with these varieties, offering early production in the months of January, February, and March," he noted.

Regarding their berry offering, they emphasized the key role of having a balanced and complete assortment of different berries for their customers. In addition to blueberries, they must continue working on strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries. "We must give prominence to all berries because customers demand it, and that will help us grow." Furthermore, in the case of raspberries, for example, despite being a risky crop, they are "even more profitable than other berries," according to one of the cooperatives. Another advantage of having a complete assortment is that it ensures labor throughout the year.

Climate and costs, main challenges
The Assembly also highlighted the growing challenges facing the Huelva agricultural sector, such as the progressive increase in production costs, obtaining nursery plants with good plant health, climate uncertainty, and regulatory pressure. On a personal level, Onubafruit highlighted the need to develop strawberry varieties that can improve overall results, as has already been done with blueberries. To this end, growers are currently opting for potted plant formats that offer greater plant health and allow for earlier production, thus avoiding production peaks.

To address these challenges, the Assembly called for unity and cooperation among farmers and cooperatives and reaffirmed the organization's commitment to continuous improvement, rural development, and value creation for its members. "Our goal is the profitability of our farmers," they emphasized.

Once again, Onubafruit's key role as a driver of development, innovation, and sustainability in the province of Huelva was reaffirmed, and a message of confidence in the cooperative group's potential and the adaptability of its professionals was sent. R&D, the entry of new generations, and the daily efforts of its farmers are shaping an even more promising future.

Roundtable
The Assembly hosted a roundtable discussion with representatives of the five member cooperatives, where all these topics were discussed and which included the following participants: Manuel Prieto, vice president of Cobella; Francisco José Picón, SAT County; José Eloy de Freslucena; Juan Reale, Huelva Coast, and Lucía Gómez, advisor of Cartayfres. They praised being part of Onubafruit for helping them market their fruit and grow, and highlighted the role that their own varietal development, especially in blueberries, has played in this growth. They also addressed the generational renewal within their cooperatives, which will ensure sustainable development over time, as well as the need for women farmers to step forward and join the Governing Councils.

Climate challenges and the lack of tools to ensure plant health were recurring themes at the roundtable, as was the need to continue researching varieties and improving different processes, with a global goal common to all cooperatives: improving fruit quality.

Along these lines, the important role of differentiation was highlighted, whether through quality, the varieties they are developing, or through business lines such as organic, which some are pursuing, despite not being easy.

Challenge: reducing complaints

Achieving fruit quality depends on a number of factors, not just the producer. Plant health at origin, field management, availability of labor to harvest at the right time, climate, transportation... Onubafruit emphasized that it was necessary to work on improving all areas to increasingly reduce the number of complaints at destination, always in pursuit of maximum fruit quality. Thus, new varieties can help, and "strictly following the instructions of agricultural technicians to act in a timely manner is essential," they noted.

In our cooperative, raspberries represent the bulk of our crop. In my case, 70% of my production is raspberries and the rest is blueberries. In my opinion, and despite the popular belief that it's not worth it, raspberry production is much more profitable than strawberry or blueberry production. It's a crop with a higher risk of adverse weather conditions, but if it turns out well, it's a success. We're currently testing new varieties whose development we'll be able to assess next season.

I'd just like to add that it's time for the cooperative's women farmers, with their extensive track record and experience, to take a step forward and join the Board of Directors. Onubafruit is already doing everything possible in this area; in many cases, we are the ones who are holding ourselves back.

Being part of a group allows us to make investments that we couldn't make individually, such as in R&D. We're much stronger together. Furthermore, now that young people are joining our cooperative, this encourages the rest of us to continue working, seeing that there's a future, and it encourages others to participate and continue growing.

The main challenge now is to continue working to improve fruit quality. To achieve this, it's essential to obtain healthy plants, and using potted plants is contributing to this. It allows us to produce earlier and avoid production peaks, despite the risk of producing in winter.

Onubafruit's numbers speak for themselves, and each and every one of us farmers is responsible for the success and growth recorded over all these years. Thus, we will continue to strive to do our work to the best of our ability.

It's important to highlight the important role our new blueberry varieties have played in this growth rate. They've opened up a very significant early production curve for us, meaning we currently have no rivals in the market at that time. We're ahead of the competition.

I started with 5 hectares of irrigated land and now I have more than 100. This is a testament to what Onubafruit has meant to me and to everyone. The advances made in the development of berry varieties and, of course, everyone's unity over these more than 20 years have been fundamental to achieving this success.

The current climate uncertainty has us focusing now on obtaining more resilient varieties and other production cycles, as well as on having the necessary personnel to be able to harvest on time and ensure the quality of the fruit is not affected.

There are cooperatives today that fail to sell all their fruit. That's not the case at Onubafruit, which plays the most important and difficult role: selling the product. Being part of it gives us the utmost peace of mind in this area. Especially in our case, as we are organic producers, which is not easy to produce or sell, as the market is limited.

For our part, we need to improve product quality. To do this, it would be interesting to develop new strawberry varieties of our own, as has been achieved with blueberries, and perhaps penalize those farmers who fail to meet quality standards for our customers.