Zespri and Enza stickers

Turners and Growers (T&G) has continued its attack on Zespri's single-desk kiwifruit export system by sending New Zealand growers material encouraging them to have their say on the ongoing debate.

Group chairman Tony Gibbs has sent growers and industry members a presentation urging them to voice their opinions, according to the New Zealand Herald.

In the presentation, Mr Gibbs said that growers needed to protect the future of orchardists growing green cultivars, following Zespri forecasts predicting that average green kiwifruit returns would fall NZ0.26 in 2009/10.

Mr Gibbs said that the fall continued a downward trend in green returns, and that over the next few years global kiwifruit supply would exceed demand, leading to a potential price crash.

The group's campaignagainst the single desk export system – in place since 1987 – stepped up a notch in July when the New Zealandhorticulture company served Zespri with awrit.

T&G's court action cited a range ofcomplaints, among them Zespri’s alleged attempt to monopolise theAustralian market for New Zealand kiwifruit, anti-competitive behaviourand sale of foreign-grown kiwifruit under the Zespri label, whichT&G says contravenes New Zealand’s Kiwifruit Export Regulations1999.