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Braeburn apple prices collapse
New Zealand
Saturday 17 November 2007
The head of the pipfruit industry is calling for better co-ordination between growers and marketers after an end-of-season price collapse for New Zealand's main export apple variety, which has been blamed on a surfeit of large-sized Braeburn apples being packed and shipped to Europe, the market that likes large apples the least.
Braeburn returns to growers will be as low as US$10 a carton as a result, compared with a top price of US$18 to US$19. Mr Palmer says the industry was well aware that there was a significant volume of large-sized fruit in this year's harvest and it should not have been sent to Europe and stated that processing fruit into juice can sometimes be a better option than taking the risk of over-supplying the market, but that decision has to be made before it is packed and exported.
Braeburn returns to growers will be as low as US$10 a carton as a result, compared with a top price of US$18 to US$19. Mr Palmer says the industry was well aware that there was a significant volume of large-sized fruit in this year's harvest and it should not have been sent to Europe and stated that processing fruit into juice can sometimes be a better option than taking the risk of over-supplying the market, but that decision has to be made before it is packed and exported.
