Archive for 'Kiwifruit'

The world is a much smaller place than when I was at school.  I barely knew where Chile and New Zealand were, never mind ever seeing fruit grown there for sale in my local shop in Germany.

Yet here I am in a warehouse in Rotterdam, taking photos of southern hemisphere kiwifruit as spotted by the IFPS Board member for Chile, Tom Tjerandsen!

It’s a small world indeed…

I travel half way around the world, and what’s the first thing I see upon entering a supermarket in Rotterdam?

This was during the industry tour mentioned a blog post or so back – so I was in the company of other IFPS members from countries such as the US, Canada, South Africa, and Chile.  They were extremely envious and wanted to know how I had managed to get the display put there just for the benefit of the tour!  Much as I would like to think I have that much influence in the global produce industry, I had to come clean and admit that it was all Zespri’s doing.  This image is a wonderful example of New Zealand’s success in the international produce industry.

I have discussed Zespri in previous posts, and say what you like about them (and Turners & Growers have had a lot to say) regarding the single desk position they hold over New Zealand’s kiwifruit exports, but you cannot deny that Zespri is extremely effective at selling kiwifruit for value added prices in the very competitive international market.

Question is, can Zespri’s success be emulated in other New Zealand produce categories without single desk structures and government regulations?

Zespri Stand at Fruit Logistica Berlin 2011

I sympathise with Turners & Growers.  I truly do.  Here they are, the quintessential New Zealand produce marketer, which in the 1960s probably did more than any other company at the time to turn kiwifruit into the commercial boon the fruit  is  for New Zealand today. But can they sell kiwifruit today?  Nope! Why not? Because of a set of  Parliamentary Regulations which ensure single desk status for what used to be the grower owned marketing company – Zespri.  Well, in a roundabout way anyway.  It is actually a little more complicated than that but I don’t want to open that can of worms right now.

Here is what I wrote on Twitter just now: 

Why do householder surveys on kiwifruit regulation? Zespri is the ultimate scale model, the NZ industry can’t afford not to have it. Period.  

Exactly 140 characters by the way, but I am digressing. I am a free marketer from way back, which is not surprising given my supermarket background; but I mean every letter of that Twitter message.  Turners & Growers have waged quite an effective PR campaign on their opposition to the single desk  model for kiwifruit and some of their arguments do actually make sense.  At the end of the day though, the horticultural industry simply cannot afford to jettison the only scale model it has in order to satisfy free market principles. Sorry guys, but no can do.