How can farmers or investors use this information? If a farmer grows or if an investor plans to start growing fruits or vegetables, significant part of which is exported to a country which is ranked high in this ranking, it may be worth considering diversifying production or investments. Moreover, the higher the country is in the ranking of the unreliable is the partner and the higher the risks for investor’s business.

,,The following criteria were used to compile the rating:

A. Bans on the import of vegetables and fruits from other countries

B. Level of import duties

C. Number of non-tariff restrictions

D. Level of corruption at customs and average time for goods to cross the border

E. Export Bans

F. Other problems such as blocking of goods entry points

The ranking does not include all countries in the region, but only those for which EastFruit has a sufficient amount of information, namely: Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Georgia, Moldova, Russia, Belarus, Turkey, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Romania.

As a result, by a huge margin from others, Russia was recognized as the region’s worst trading partner for fruit and vegetable trade. This is not at all surprising, because there are almost no countries left in the region against which Russia country has not imposed an embargo on vegetable and fruit imports at least once and most of these were the politically motivated bans. In the last week alone, two countries in the region have faced bans on supplies to Russia: Armenia and Moldova.

Georgia can be considered the best partner of the region. Almost complete trade liberalization, low duties, the absence of non-tariff barriers and bans on imports and exports and a low level of corruption make this country a good trading partner, even despite the small size of the domestic market,"- EastFruit reports.