Chinese products are already competing with walnuts from the US, Chile and Ukraine, forcing other producers to adjust to the new export realities,” EastFruit quoted Andrei Lapa, owner of a walnut processing business, as saying in a podcast on the Gorykhovod YouTube channel. “I was amazed at how much it(walnut from China, LP note) has a high kernel to shell ratio. There it turned out to be about 70% kernel and 30% shell. The situation with Ukrainian walnuts is the opposite,” the businessman says.
He added that because of such a thin shell, Chinese walnuts are extremely easy to peel. Although it may still be inferior to the organic Ukrainian product in terms of taste.
As Oleg Tirsină, chairman of the Association of Nut Growers of Moldova ANRM, explained for Logos Press earlier, in the 2025-26 season the price level on the European market will largely depend on what position the European Union will take with regard to the supply of walnuts from China.
At the beginning of the season on the European market there were quite a lot of offers for delivery of early Chinese walnuts of “185” variety at the price of $2.30-2.40/kg (fruits in shell). This is quite a high price for goods from China.
Walnuts from Moldova are in a different price category and a different “time window” of supply. However, the fact that European traders perceive working with Chinese walnuts – both kernels and fruits in shell – as a natural “variant of the norm” is a cause for concern. And European consumers already perceive Chinese walnuts as being of good quality.
