Kiwifruit exports set to bounce back into growth mode

New Zealand's kiwifruit exports are on the rebound after a grim couple of years.

Kiwifruit marketer Zespri is anticipating strong export growth across all fruit varieties this year, with about 193 million trays expected to be shipped around the world.

That’s a significant increase on the 133 million New Zealand-grown trays shipped last season, and also up on the 2021 season tally of 175 million trays.

Though it’s still early in the season, Zespri said the latest supply estimate reflects the positive growing conditions across New Zealand in recent months.

Chief executive Dan Mathieson said the company’s key focus this year was delivering consistently good quality fruit to customers and consumers throughout the season, after fruit quality issues bedevilled the industry, due to the impact of Covid-19, a string of extreme weather events, a severe labour shortage, and supply chain issues.

“While it’s still early, the crop is looking excellent and there’s a lot of excitement and optimism in the industry,” Mathieson said.

“That excitement is shared by our customers who are keenly anticipating having a lot more kiwifruit to meet the strong demand we’re seeing across our markets.”

Mathieson says managing the increased volume of fruit throughout the supply chain and delivering consistently good quality fruit was the key consideration in the industry’s season planning process.

“We’re trying to make sure we’re striking the right balance of having a good source of early season fruit to capitalise on early season sales opportunities, and having fruit that stores well so that we can have a consistent flow of fruit through the season and minimise late season quality issues.”

Kiwifruit is New Zealand’s leading horticulture export. Zespri posted global operating revenue of $4.2 billion in FY23.

Mathieson said Zespri was closely monitoring the disruption to international shipping though the company was not affected by the disruption in the Red Sea, instead shipping via the Panama Canal.

Zespri is 100 per cent owned by current and former kiwifruit growers and has the statutory right to export all New Zealand kiwifruit, except to Australia.

The company has a global team of 850 based in Mount Maunganui and throughout Asia, Europe and the Americas.

It works with 2800 New Zealand growers and 1500 contracted growers overseas.

In 2022-2023 it supplied a total of 183.5 million trays of kiwifruit to consumers in more than 50 markets.