The hail storms which occurred in May and in June affected the quality of apples. This year, a smaller quantity of apples is intended for export. Asked by IPN, Iurie Fală, executive director of the Moldova Fruct Association, said that although the harvest is larger than last year’s, about 670 thousand tonnes of apples, from a quality standpoint, are worse than last year's output.

According to Iurie Fală, it was a difficult year. Hail rains stopped the pollination of apple flowers. Additionally, the rains have made it harder to apply agro-technical measures of treatment against pests, which negatively affected the quality of the harvest.

The executive director of Moldova Fruct added that almost 60% of the estimated apple harvest will be processed.

According to Iurie Fală, apple harvest in EU countries was 13.3 million tonnes of apples last year while current year harvest is 10.5 million tonnes.