EU Apple Crop Forecast at 9.496 Million Tonnes, Down 15.6%; Polish Output Seen 29.9% Lower

EU supply enters the season 15.6% lower

Apple production in the European Union is forecast at 9.496 million tonnes this season, 15.6% below the 2025 crop and below the multi-year average, according to WAPA data presented at the Prognosfruit 2026 conference and reported by sad24.pl. The portal e-sadownictwo.pl put the same forecast at about 9.5 million tonnes and the decline at around 15%, describing a market that enters the season with visibly limited supply.

The forecasts were discussed at a panel on the apple market held during the SGGW Open Days in Wilanow, where Mirosław Maliszewski, president of the Polish fruit growers association Związek Sadowników RP, announced that the organisation will publish regular market scenarios for individual fruit species.

Poland records the sharpest fall

Poland remains the largest apple producer in the European Union, but it also shows the steepest decline in the WAPA table. The Polish crop is forecast at 2.665 million tonnes against 3.8 million tonnes a year earlier, a fall of 29.9%. Maliszewski cautioned that last season's Polish harvest may have been understated, and that the accuracy of the entire European forecast depends heavily on how much fruit Poland actually picks.

• Poland: 2.665 million tonnes, down 29.9%
• Italy: 2.269 million tonnes, down 2.2%
• France: 1.162 million tonnes, down 24.2%
• Germany: 1.013 million tonnes, down 10.9%
• Netherlands: 195,000 tonnes, down 17.5%
• Belgium: 166,000 tonnes, down 25.1%

That leaves practically every significant competitor of Polish growers with less fruit than in the previous season, e-sadownictwo.pl reported.

Heat damage shifts attention from tonnage to quality

A separate strand of the debate concerns commercial quality. The portal kobietawsadzie.pl, citing a market note from Robert Sas of IPSAD, reported that high temperatures in many regions of France, Germany, Austria, the Benelux countries and Italy halted fruit growth and caused loss of firmness, sunburn and, in places, premature fruit drop. Gala and its sports are described as particularly affected, with fruit diameter in some regions not exceeding 60 mm at harvest.

Several of the quality figures cited there run deeper than the tonnage forecasts. The French industry speaks of a fall of around 30% in the output of quality apples against the previous season, while the German crop is put at almost 20% below 2025 — a larger drop than the 10.9% shown in the WAPA forecast reported by sad24.pl. In the Austrian region of Styria, the harvest is expected at about 65% of last year's level.

For Polish Gala growers the situation in Italy matters most. Trentino produces more than 500,000 tonnes of apples, including significant volumes of dessert varieties, and total output there is put at about 10–12% below a year earlier by IPSAD. Early post-harvest information points to smaller calibre and fruit weight, lower firmness, sunburn and a higher share of fruit rejected during sorting, which means the decline in marketable dessert supply may exceed the decline in tonnage.

Stocks and costs remain the constraint

Smaller crops do not automatically translate into better prices. Maliszewski pointed to large volumes of unsold apples carried into the new season, particularly in Italy and Germany, and said the level of those stocks and the pace at which they are sold will shape prices in the coming months. He described apples as the species that disappointed Polish growers most in the spring, in large part, he said, through the sector's own mistakes.

Costs frame the other side. A grower quoted by kobietawsadzie.pl said that about 1.50–1.60 zloty per kilogram after sorting is hard to accept for a producer of high-quality Gala at current farm costs, and that pressure at that level pushes growers to cut spending on crop protection, fertilisation and pruning, with consequences for fruit quality in later seasons. IPSAD noted that the real supply of quality Gala in Europe can only be assessed once harvesting and sorting are complete.