Welcome to our latest grower update – bringing you up to speed with the latest Seeka and Industry . Our remarkable kiwifruit year continues. Fruit quality has been nothing short of exceptional, losses low and off shore quality very good.
Our SunGold volume is down to 51k trays in store, fruit loss is exceptional compared to the Industry, offshore quality excellent and the time pool is already ahead of our forecast. We expect the fruit to be drawn down over the next two weeks and our forecast to increase on the back of these factors.
The Hayward Conventional volume is a little slower to go, with around 700k trays in store, with big load outs in the next two weeks. Fruit loss is really very good at less than 1% and our offshore fruit performance again excellent. Noting our earlier commentary on the provisioning of quality costs by Zespri, we expect that some of this will be released in the next forecast and a substantial increase in the forecasted payments to growers.
With 13k trays in store the Hayward Organic programme is fully ordered and loadouts will finish in the next two weeks. Fruitloss is currently just over 1% and offshore the fruit is performing well.
The industry discussion on whether or not the SunGold Organic category should be in its own pool for the 2020 season continues. This was discussed at the Grower Council meeting this week. For the 2020 season there is expected to be 1.6m trays of SunGold Organic. The message from the Council was that there needs to be transparent consultation with all SunGold Organic growers and that the place for growers risk to be managed is in a pool and that this category should be in its own pool. And following the principle that risks and rewards should fall where they lay, the Council has previously endorsed a separate pool.
Away from kiwifruit, our avocado harvest is in full swing. We are scheduling nine containers a week at the moment with only the rain holding us up from achieving that. Markets have been delighted with our quality and our own wholesale floor has been complimenting the export program with sales at over $200k per week. Our only comments would be that the markets are flush with smaller sized fruit, and anything you can do to sort this unsettled spring weather out would be appreciated.
Back to kiwifruit, our teams are preparing the pollen mills and getting the contracts ready for your flower supply.
To the numbers
Seeka
Aongatete
Aongatete fruitloss excludes fruit under the insurance claim.
Kind regards
Michael
Seeka Key
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