Slovenian food industry in good shape, summit hears
Optimism was also voiced by Agriculture Minister Dejan Židan in his address, in which he stressed that Slovenian food companies were increasingly innovative in terms of products and technologies, were increasing profitability and entering new markets.
He added that internationalisation was among the ministry's priorities and that intensive cooperation was ongoing in the recent time especially with Russia, Germany, Montenegro, Poland and China.
Kuhar highlighted signs of business stabilisation for the third consecutive year, adding that vegetable oils was the only food production sector to finish 2016 in the red.
He therefore believes companies in the industry should now focus on the future and breakthroughs to make sure they stay in the game.
A total of 720 food companies are active in Slovenia and they employed 13,300 people at the end of 2016, 5.4% more than a year earlier, but their sales revenues fell by 0.3% to just over EUR 2bn.
Although the drop was small, Kuhar sees this as a bad sign because productivity fell despite a growth in employment.
In absolute terms, production increased last year - by 1.5% in the food sector and 3% in the beverage sector.
Both export and import of food products increased, but the growth was slower than in previous years.
The increase in import and export was the highest with Croatia, which has now become the most important market for Slovenian food exports, overtaking Italy.
However, Italy remains the top country for food imported to Slovenia, but Kuhar also highlighted a strongly growing share of Germany.
Retail prices of food in Slovenia increased by 1.1% and are closing in on the EU average. Currently, the prices are at 90.8% of the European average.
On the other hand, wholesale prices at producers are witnessing a strong trend in the opposite direction and Kuhar stressed that the prices at suppliers have been pushed below the level of five years ago.
Turning to state support for the food industry, he said the golden age of state subsidies of up to EUR 40m was long gone, as only EUR 4.8m was available in the budget for food production last year.
At today's conference in Bled, agricultural and food companies and cooperatives signed a declaration together with three university-based incubators on cooperation to boost innovativeness, entrepreneurship and competitiveness of the agri-food sector.