It has been a good year so far for peaches and nectarines at Prima Fresh Fruit, based in the Gouldburn Valley, Victoria. "There was a lot of rain in November which caused damage to our apricot crop, but the peaches and nectarines fared much better," explains Jackson Bennet, National Sales Manager at the company.
Prima Fresh grow stone fruit over 400 hectares. At the moment all of this is open to the elements, but this year will see the first planting done under netting for peaches, nectarine and plums. "This has now become essential, according to Jackson. "Hail can wipe out the entire crop, in each of the last three seasons our stone fruit has been impacted by hail. We will also have plastic covering to protect the fruit from rain events."
"The yields have been normal this season, the sizes started out small but now we have good, large fruit which is what consumers want. Demand on the domestic market has been ok, but not sensational. The weather impacted consumer confidence, demand for apricots was good though. On the export side, Malaysia has been a strong market for us, China is still suffering from a weakened economy and they are not taking the volumes that they have in the past. That said, demand from Asia for white peaches and nectarines always increases in the lead up to Chinese New Year, especially for the larger fruit. We do a gift pack with nine fruits which is ideal for gifting at New Year, this is also popular in Australia."
Chile is increasing exports of stone fruit into the Asian markets and Jackson said that it has had an impact, "We can't compete on price and the quality from Chile is also improving."
Shipping has been a significant challenge in recent years, with a shortage of equipment and high prices, but this seems to have eased with lower prices this year.
"All in all, we are very happy with how our brand is performing, both overseas and at home. Peaches and nectarines are sold under the Prima Fresh brand, while our apricots have done extremely well under our Prime of Prima brand."
For more information:
Jackson Bennett
Prima Fresh
Tel: +61 432 344 432
jackson@primafreshfruit.com.au