Articles
FRUIT FARMS IN THE FOOTHILL REGIONS OF POLAND
Wholesalers purchased the following quantities of fruits (in thousand tons) in 1976:
| apples | – | 608,9 |
| plums | – | 126,5 |
| strawberries | – | 119,3 |
| sour cherries | – | 18,1 |
| sweet cherries | – | 16,1 |
| raspberries | – | 11,9 |
| gooseberries | – | 6,2 |
| others | – | 25,9 |
| Total | 932,9 |
When private trade and consumption by the growers are also taken into account, it can be assumed that total fruit production is about 1 ½ million ton.
About 90% of the fruit is produced on private farms (Rosowski, 1977).
Polish statistics consider only orchards above one are.
Such orchards are present on about 1.265.000 private farms; 786.000 of these had about 0,24 ha; 35.000 farms had 1–3 ha and only 4.500 farms more than 3 ha.
It was estimated that fruit production has a commercial character on only 25.000 private farms, or only on 2% of the farms with fruit plantations above 1 are.
More than 70% of the commercial fruit production comes from these 25.000 farms, where the average yield varies from 8 to 10 ton per ha.
There are three main fruit regions in Poland:
- in the central part of the country (the largest one)
- in the southern part (foothills)
- in the northern part of the country.
The highest concentration of fruit plantations in the southern region is in the Carpathian foothills and in the Beskids.
The total area of these two subregions is 1.404.000 ha and the total area of fruit plantations here is about 40.000 ha.
This makes up more than 5% of the agricultural land and more than 12% of the fruit area in the whole country (Makosz and Slowik, 1975).
There are about 25.000 ha in apples, 8.000 ha in plums, 5.000 ha in small fruits and 2.000 ha in cherries, pears and other fruits.
In good years the total yield of fruit reaches 175.000 tons.