Early shipments of South African avocados land in Shanghai, marking the first arrivals of the season
South African fruit producer ZZ2, exporter Core Fruit and Mission Produce Southern Africa are ideally placed to take advantage of the opening of the Chinese market.
That is according to JJ Van der Spuy, commercial manager of Core Fruit.
“Our first containers were shipped on the Maersk Freeport and are due to be distributed by Mission Produce Inc’s global distribution network and particularly its partner in China, Mr Avocado,” he explained.
ZZ2 has made ”substantial investments” in a state-of-the-art avocado packhouse and an avocado nursery that can produce more than 300,000 trees on both clonal and seeding rootstocks.
The joint venture company, Selokwe Agri, has plans to develop over 1,000ha of avocados for global distribution in the premium growing region of Limpopo in South Africa.
“Due to ZZ2 being very early we took advantage of the relatively empty market in China and sent several containers to Mr Avocado,” said Clive Garrett, marketing executive at ZZ2.
He pointed out that South Africa had a logistical advantage over its largest competitor Peru, in that the shipping time to China from South Africa is about a week shorter.
“Also due to the fact that ZZ2 is relatively late producer there is very little fruit from Peru in China early in our season,” Garrett explained.
Core Fruit has experience in exporting fruit – namely apples, pears and citrus – to China, and have been doing so since the market opened to South African fruit several years ago.
“Mission Produce Southern Africa is also extremely well-placed regarding Mission Produce Inc’s global distribution network and particularly its partner in China, Mr Avocado,” said Van der Spuy.
”Mission and Mr Avocado are the only shippers and receivers in China with one brand from multiple growing countries and have been in partnership since 2017.
”Mr Avocado has ripening and distribution facilities in China along with its long-standing partners in retail,” he outlined.
Garrett said that, depending on the results, the group hoped to grow the Chinese market further.
“The market in Europe can at times – especially when Peru is in full production – get very full and having China, India and Japan now open to South African fruit will just give us more options,” he added.
Meanwhile, South Africa is still on track to harvest and pack a crop of 22mmn cartons this year.
The first fruit found a strong market when it arrived in Europe and the UK, but exporters expect them to soften as more fruit from South America, mainly Peru, arrives.
