Frankly Speaking

Welcome to this week’s update to our growers and stakeholders. Here we go people. We are a few weeks out from New Zealand kiwifruit harvest 2021. There is a lot going on as we close out the avocado harvest in New Zealand, are midway through the kiwiberry harvest and are continuing with the nashi and European pear harvests in Australia.

The New Zealand avocado harvest, while challenging, has been very successful. In spite of a small size fruit profile with an abundance of small fruit – export tray returns will be close to $28.00, and much higher for the larger sizes. Seeka again has delivered on its high quality brand and our fruit has been well sought after in Australia. Shipping has been unsettled with most vessel voyages disrupted from plan in some way. Sites that process avocados have the added benefit of having a workforce in the shed that is now immediately available for kiwifruit.

Kiwiberry are in the home straight with about 10 days to go. Fruit quality looks excellent in most orchards and we are slightly ahead of our estimated volumes. Pleasingly the fruit is flowing through the supply chain well, is well received in the markets and our fruit receiving a premium over poorer quality fruit. So the early signs are promising.

We are well into our seasonal recruitment drive. We have secured 211 RSE workers directly and 89 RSE workers from the allocation of 2,000 overseas workers allowed into New Zealand. These 300 alongside our continuing RSE workers will bring the total RSE number to about 460 – the same number as we had last year but much less than the 1180 we normally would have. These workers will come at a significant cost, and will complement the more than 3,000 local workers we hope to employ. Arms and legs in the packhouses, orchards and lab operations are critical and if you know of anyone looking for a job – please direct them our way.

Zespri has published the 2020 Kiwifruit February forecast. The Seeka Entity team are finalising your individual forecast and it will be available early next week.  The trend in this  forecast is  increased class 1 fruit values and reductions in Zespri NSS and class 2 returns. The Seeka pool has benefited from the fruit value increases and any reductions in Zespri Class 2 returns have been offset by higher than previously forecasted SeekaFresh returns. Supplier accountability results have been finalised and therefore forecast reflects actual returns. As a result, Seeka sees a significant improvement in forecasted OGR’s this forecast. 

From the Technical team we are getting regular updates from the Seeka fruit monitor programme. The SunGold conventional crop has on average dry matter levels 0.5% higher than the same time last year.  Fresh weight is up 8 grams compared to last year and colour development is tracking ahead.  Brix’s for this category are in line with last year.  Fruit pressure is slightly down on last year, although not significant.

The Hayward conventional monitor data for average dry matter is 0.4% up, fresh weight on average is 84g (3g up on the same time last year) and unlike last year fruit size is relatively consistent throughout the growing regions.  The average brix and brix fractile are tracking slightly behind last year.  Fruit pressure is slightly down on last year, although consistent across the regions.

Hayward organic average dry matter levels are 1.0% higher than similar time last year, fresh weight is on average 7g heavier than last year although since the prior monitor round on average there has been a levelling of weight gain.  Brix is in line with the 2020 levels and fruit pressure very similar to last year.

So for all categories, dry matter is look good, fruit size is better than last year and the maturity indications are that the season will start a similar time to last year and in the case of SunGold this may even be a little earlier.

The first of the After 5’s are scheduled to start on the 8th of March, where the team are looking forward to catching up with you. If you have not already, please click this link to register.

Kind regards

Michael