Kiwifruit marketer set to continue Northern Hemisphere expansion, with red variety R19 poised for commercial production in Italy and SunGold volumes expected to grow
Kiwifruit marketer Zespri is pushing ahead with the continued expansion of its new variety programme in the Northern Hemisphere, as production and demand for its SunGold product continues to grow and excitement builds around red variety R19.
Speaking exclusively to Fruitnet, the company’s executive officer for the Northern Hemisphere, Nick Kirton, confirmed that R19 – which is marketed as Zespri RubyRed out of New Zealand – will soon be grown commercially in Italy.
“We’re still going through the partner selection process and contractual arrangements, but we hope they will start planting in the next planting window, so this coming winter,” he revealed. “We’re still working through with potential supplier partners, and we’re starting to engage with growers to gauge interest.”
Under the terms of its agreement with shareholder growers in New Zealand, Zespri is currently permitted to allocate a total of 1,000ha of new variety production in the Northern Hemisphere, and the group plans to use 170ha of that allocation for R19.
Meanwhile, the company says its Northern Hemisphere SunGold production will grow by 22.3 per cent in 2025 compared with the previous year, driven by favourable conditions as well as an 11.2 per cent increase in production area.
The volume of green variety Hayward is also expected to be larger, by 6 per cent year on year to 7mn trays.
The company’s biggest Northern Hemisphere supplier of Zespri-branded fruit remains Italy, where growers expect to produce 24.8 per cent more SunGold.
France, meanwhile, anticipates 1.87mn trays, more or less in line with the previous campaign.
And Greece is set to harvest its first 70ha of commercial SunGold production.
“The results of the 2025 season demonstrate the strength of our global supply model and the Northern Hemisphere’s increasingly central role in guaranteeing availability of Zespri kiwifruit for 12 months of the year,” Kirton said in a statement issued to the Italian media.
“Every season, we work together with our supply chain partners to improve productivity and, at the same time, to maintain the highest quality standards that set out brand apart. We cannot wait to begin harvesting.”
He added: “Looking to the future, we have major growth ambitions and goals for the Northern Hemisphere. Among these is the allocation of new hectares and the ongoing development of our varietal portfolio – with the recent authorisation to commercialise the red-fleshed variety Zespri Red also in the Northern Hemisphere – which represent strategic levers to respond to an ever-expanding global demand for premium kiwifruit.”
In that context, Zespri revealed, work is underway to expand Northern Hemisphere production of SunGold by 420ha, of which 300ha are inn Italy, 70ha in Greece, 40ha in France, and the remainder in South Korea.
