Riding atop the avocado wave

Rose Weatherall grafts Hass fruiting scions on to rootstock in the nursery's polyhouse extension. Photo / John Stone

Lynwood Nursery is sitting pretty as global demand for avocados far outstrips supply and is likely to increase further in new markets

More than 15 years of avocado cloning research has earned Whangarei nurseryman and orchardist Stephen Wade a sweet position as avocado planting accelerates to meet increasing consumer demand.

Worldwide consumption of the popular fruit is increasing by 10 per cent annually while production is rising by only three per cent.

China and India are just starting to discover the delights of eating avocados, which Mr Wade said the Guinness Book of Records had classified as the world's most nutritious fruit.

His Lynwood Avocado Nursery at Maunu has 70,000 avocado seedlings and clones being readied for sale to Whangarei, Far North and Bay of Plenty orchardists eager to get them into the ground.

On Monday, NZ Avocado chief executive Jen Scoular opened an extension to the nursery, consisting of three 1700 q m polyhouses in which about 25,000 seeding avocados are growing.

There are also 19,000 plants in "a shadehouse down the road".

With seedlings worth about $20 each and clones $38 plus a $4-$6 tree royalty, expanding sales have increased nursery staff from four to 22 and turnover has risen from $400,000 to $2 million in the past two years.

And the growth is expected to continue. Mr Wade, who has travelled worldwide to learn the latest cloning techniques, said Lynwood Avocado Nursery was among only about six places around the world - one of the others is in Gisborne - where an avocado cloning method developed by South African Dr Andre Ernst in the 1990s were being successfully followed.

There is a graph on a Lynwood nursery wall explaining the Ernst technique, but the work involved in getting high-fruiting avocado varieties like Hass grafted to hardy rootstock (mostly South African varieties resistant to Phytophthora root disease) is complicated and exacting. No rival nursery is likely to reach the potential which Lynwood and its Gisborne counterpart have to meet rising demand for young avocado plants.

Lynwood's production of young avocados is booked for sale through to 2017.
"We're riding a wave," Mr Wade said.

His 13ha property at Maunu has been in his family since 1941. His grandparents, George and Lynda Wade, followed by parents John and Pamela Wade, ran a poultry farm there for about 40 years, with the chooks phased out from 1998.

The orchard was created in 1983 with about 800 trees planted over 4ha. This was followed with an additional 6ha planted in 1989 and half of that development was with avocados propagated at Lynwood.

Some of these original trees are now being cut out and replaced with new clones, thriving in mounded plantings which keep their young roots clear of surface water.