By PHILIPPA STEVENSON agriculture editor
HortResearch says economic necessity is driving the controversial sale of its world-leading pipfruit breeding programme.
Chief executive Paul McGilvary said insufficient industry funding had forced the crown research institute to consider other options, including overseas buyers, to maintain the programme, which the $500 million apple and pear
sector regards as vital.
"We are committed and determined to maintain the total fruit science capability that is world class," he said. "Once the capability is diminished it is a long and expensive process to rebuild."
HortResearch needed to get the most value from the asset, not just for HortResearch but for New Zealand.
In the past 20 years, an estimated $20 million of grower and taxpayer money has been spent on the programme, which produced such new apples as Pacific Rose and Jazz and kept New Zealand ahead of the competitive international market.
Its sale has been described as "really dumb" by Pipfruit Growers NZ chairman Phil Alison, whose organisation is in discussions with HortResearch in an attempt to secure the programme for growers.
"We have no alternative. In the future these new varieties will be used by our main competitors against us," he said.
Alison said the crown research institute system needed an overhaul because "to flog off breeding programmes on a short-term basis to underpin their finances is wrong".
Pipfruit Growers' partner is Associated International Group of Nurseries, represented by the New Zealand Fruit Tree Company, one of eight global AIGN members.
McGilvary said HortResearch's move had been misunderstood, and "options on the outputs of the apple and pear programmes" were for sale.
A deadline had not been set for completing deals.
"Contrary to some perceptions, CRIs are required to be commercially viable companies and compete for public and private sector research contracts," McGilvary said.
But unlike private companies, CRIs were also expected to have a social responsibility and do research for the benefit of New Zealand.
He said HortResearch met both requirements.
