about adequate for the present acreage but 

 could not supply any extensive expansion. The 

 river supplying the San Rafael area, fed by 

 melting snow and other nnountain run off. 



carries a great deal of silt and has deposited 

 this material along its course, so that the 

 river is higher than the surrounding land. 



TABLE 13. — Apples and pears: Costs of handling and transport Rio Negro Valley to Buenos Aires, 1958 season 



Apples 



Freight--Hailroad Rio Negro to Buenos Aires . 



Disinfection of car 



Transfer car to truck, Buenos Aires 



Transport to cold storage 



Transport cold storage to dock 



Loading, seal and countermark 



Cold storage^ 



Taxes^ 



.'^Miscellaneous costs-* 



Dispatch customs 



Total cost, rail movement Rio Negro-Buenos Aires, 

 handling and loading ship 



Pesos per 



packed box 



6.72 



.25 

 .90 

 .90 

 .95 



7.10 

 5.46 

 5.00 

 2.50 



Dollars per 

 packed box 

 0.177 

 .001 

 .007 

 .024 

 .024 

 .025 

 .187 

 .144 

 .132 

 .066 



Pesos per 



packed box 



6.72 



.044 



.25 



.90 



.90 



.95 

 7.10 

 5.95 

 5.00 

 2.50 



Dollars per 

 packed box 

 0.177 

 .001 

 .007 

 .024 

 .024 

 .025 

 .187 

 .157 

 .132 

 .065 



30 days in cold storage. 



5 percent and 2.3 percent of price of first sale — estimated at 70 pesos for apples and 75 pesos for pears. 



Amortization, administration in Buenos Aires, etc. 



Irrigation canals are led off on both sides of 

 the river in a herringbone pattern. The entire 

 system is gravity fed. Some years, water is 

 somewhat short, but to date it has not been so 

 short as to affect production levels materially. 

 Occasionally, spring floods are a problem 

 when winter snow accumulation has been ex- 

 ceptionally heavy in the mountains or sudden, 

 sharp spring thaws occur. 



TABLE 14. --Apples and pears: Summary of costs Rio Negro Valley, 1958 

 season 



Item 



Apples 



Pears 





(/. S. dollars 

 per packed box 

 0.34 

 .75 



U. S. dollars 

 per packed box 





.72 





Total cost f.o.b. Rio Negro 



Freight and handling charges 

 to port 



1.09 

 .79 



1.16 



.80 



Total cost loaded ship 



Buenos Aires 



1.88 



1.96 



Cultural and packing costs . --Production and 

 packing practices and methods for fresh ap- 

 ples and pears in Mendoza Province are gen- 

 erally identical to those in the Rio Negro 

 Valley. 



Because of the larger holdings in Mendoza 

 and the diversified plantings of fruit, it was 

 not possible to develop detailed cultural costs 

 as was done for the Rio Negro Valley. How- 

 ever, packing costs were worked out for the 

 San Rafael area and, using the actual average 

 prices paid growers as the fruit costs, the 

 data in table 16 were developed. 



Fruit canning . --From the data on the utili- 

 zation of fruit grown in Mendoza Province, it 

 is obvious that processing is an important in- 

 dustry in the area, taking 35 percent of the 

 total fruit. 



Several types of fruit are canned, with 

 peaches being by far the most important. In 

 addition, sonne pears are canned but this 



product has been held to a very low volume 

 because of the lack of peeling machinery. 

 Hand peeling yields a relatively high-cost 

 product with a limited outlet. Some trial lots 

 of plums have also been packed. With no ap- 

 preciable interest developed in consuming 

 channels, no potential volume is seen for 

 plums in the hear future. 



Canners are looking to European markets 

 for their largest future increases in sales. 

 Argentine canned peaches have generally re- 

 ceived good acceptance in European markets 

 in recent years. 



The major problem confronting Argentine 

 canners in their attempts to build an export 

 market is the lack of a stable domestic mar- 

 ket, and a great deal of consumer education is 

 necessary to build such an outlet. The Argen- 

 tine public is not normally in the habit of using 

 canned fruit except peaches, which are distrib- 

 uted and sold throughout the country. Even in 

 the case of peaches, much room for expansion 

 still exists. Canners are somewhat reluctant 

 to expand production too rapidly for possible 

 export outlets when there is no domestic mar- 

 ket to take the goods if exports are not real- 

 ized. 



However, Argentine trade figures show that 

 canned fruit exports have increased sharply in 

 recent years (table 19). A breakdown by com- 

 nnodity is not available; these items constitute 

 a single category in Argentine customs sched- 

 ules. However, it may be assumed that the 

 heavy preponderance is peaches. 



Canners generally buy peaches from growers 

 on an orchard run basis. Only one plant at- 

 tempts to buy on a quality basis. Fruit is lye 

 peeled and graded for packing. Sound unblem- 

 ished peaches are packed as halves, spotted 

 fruit is hand trimmed and sliced, and that 

 which would require a high degree of trimnning 

 goes into jam and preserves. 



10 



