The local fingerlime industry has been growing rapidly in recent years and has been boosted by the formation of the Australian Native Fingerlime Alliance in 2024.
Chair of ANFA and owner of Green Valley Fingerlimes says the country's producers can lead the way across the world, especially with consumers becoming more aware of the native fruit and its uses.
"ANFA has over 30 growers as members at the moment but we've only just opened that up," Ms King said. "It is pretty amazing. We know there are some larger growers with around 20,000 trees coming into play soon, and they've come on board as well. It's definitely growing, and we are hoping to grow the market with it. Consumers are definitely becoming more aware of fingerlimes as well. One of the things that were highlighted for me was when I went overseas, and I could see back to where we were once when it was virtually an unknown, and 80 per cent didn't know about it and 20 did. But here in Australia, it's the other way where 20 per cent may not know but 80 per cent have the knowledge."
Photos: courtesy Green Valley Fingerlimes Facebook page.
This alliance brings together passionate growers, researchers, and advocates to represent the growers, directing research in areas of production, genetics and innovation - especially given that fingerlimes are a unique branch of citrus.
The first meeting was held at Hort Connections in Melbourne in June, and since then a Fingerlime field and presentation day.
The speakers included UQ Research Scientist, Joseph Nastasi, who spoke about the latest Research and Developments in Fingerlimes, Penny Measham DAF and FASTA Director who addressed export pathway development, Chris Findlater presented on Commercial Development of Fingerlimes and Joel Johnson from UQ told attendees about Native Australian citrus: the sweet and the sour.
There was also a talk on developing and Australian-led industry with parallels with the macadamia story from Leoni Kojetin, who is the Macadamia Industry Development Manager and Matt Golinski was a special guest cooking in the orchard. He is a highly regarded professional and celebrity chef with a passion for creating cuisine with fresh, seasonal and local ingredients.
"We looked at future avenues for research that we'd like to develop with ANFA," Ms King said. "A few things that I was able to bring back from overseas is seeing how the industry is developing in different countries. I thought that maybe Australia was behind, but I have been able to discover that we are actually in front and quite advanced. If you look at the amount of research that we are doing under ANFA and pooling it all together so we have the designated area to see it in one spot. Also, public awareness is a big part of it. The government and other industry areas are also getting behind finger limes and Australian native products are becoming a specialty and something that needs more funding towards."
Ms King says the industry body is working to attract more growers to come and be a part of the growing organisation, with another field day and presentations set for November.
"United we can get more funding united we can get more exports and united we can do a lot more directed research that is useful to the grower," she said. "ANFA is one of the greatest things our industry has done, and hopefully we can lead the world in Fingerlime research. I believe that is important because it's an endemic product of Australia.
While it is the off-season for fingerlimes, with the season running from December to July-August, Green Valley has still been kept busy.
"We are breaking out into a few different avenues," she said. "We are making new products and there's also a lot of research that's been happening on my property, and associated study papers published on fingerlimes, through our partnership with the University of Queensland. Some research is more on the food science side of things; so, looking at the structural integrity of the pearls and the fruit themselves over different storage times and using different techniques. We're also doing infrared spectroscopy as a quality assurance tool and at some point, we hope to get to a digital signature where we can get traceability of product. So, when we do a powder, it will be 100% fingerlime powder, and not adulterated with lime and standard citrus. Finally, on the farm, we are also branching out into unique fingerlime farm accommodation just to mix it up and diversify a bit."
For more information
Jade King
Green Valley Fingerlimes
Phone: +61 405 125 791
[email protected]
www.greenvalleyfingerlimes.com
ANFA Chair
[email protected]