Bangkok, Thailand – For Bangkok-based exporter Peyton Enloe, getting Thai fresh fruit and vegetables onto Russian supermarket shelves has become an almost impossible task.
Russian consumers are cutting back on luxuries as the value of the rouble plummets to record lows. Not only that, the Aeroflot planes Enloe relies on to transport his produce are running out of space as flights fill up with Russian tourists cutting their holidays short.
“We’ve basically lost market access to Russia,” Enloe, managing director of Purithai Produce, which ships fresh and frozen produce to Europe, America and Russia, told Al Jazeera.
“My Russian customers told me people don’t have money to even buy the basics, let alone ‘exotic’ produce like mangos, durians, rambutans.”
Russia’s economy is being hammered by Western-led sanctions introduced in response to Russian President Vladimir…
