Storage fees were not standard and most operators were reluctant to discuss the subject although it
appears that a price of 250 AZN per month per ton is not unusual. Few of the new facilities were even
near to full capacity with product. Indeed, the larger ones did not have enough apparent product to
support minimal operating costs. The exception to this was AgroServices MMC of Baku which had
limited storage which was entirely empty due to a lack of input product and who expressed the desire to
increase production if they could but find a reliable source of potatoes. Accordingly, they were entering
into contracts with some growers to produce potatoes and other crops to maintain a consistent supply for
future operations.
There were several reasons given for these new facilities being empty. It being winter, most of the
previous year’s harvest had already been sold at post harvest prices; the exception being some
persimmons which are a late fall harvest crop, with some harvests continuing as late as December.
Secondly, it was the result of a lack of operating capital on the part of private warehouse owners who
could not acquire the short term financing needed to floor products that would be held for a longer post
harvest period and farmers who because of a similar lack of short term funds had to sell their crops at
harvest time. Additional reasons given included the problem of farmers not knowing the sellers or even
the existence of available public cold storage and warehousemen not knowing, how to extend the storage
time for fruit such as apples by application of controlled atmosphere conditions as well as cleaning and
waxing the fruit prior to storing. Helping to establish linkages between producers and warehousing cold
chain facilities should be an important area for PSCEP.
As discussed above, operators necessarily forthcoming in regards to operating costs, but it often appeared
they really did not have a handle on the full cost of operating their facility. Most expressed a general cost
of approximately 1000AZN per month for the average sized units. None seem to be particularly
concerned about the cost of energy although four were purposely located near railways from which they
secured a reliable source of electricity. Energy costs are of significant concern globally to most cold chain
facility operators and it should be expected will become of major concern to those of Azerbaijan as well
in the future.