Polish strawberry production down

In 2005, Polish strawberry production fell by about three percent compared to 2004. Production was down due to a two-week delay in the harvest and also because many farmers did not harvest this year because of low prices. Prices for processing strawberries as well as strawberries for export continue to fall. A 46 percent drop was registered between the average export price in the first half of 2004 and the same period of 2005. In July 2005, in response to demands from Poland, the European Commission initiated a nine-month safeguard investigation of frozen strawberry imports into EU.