Newspaper Article 1994 – Kiwifruit

Kiwifruit

By Geoff Mercer
Staff reporter, Hastings

Hawke’s Bay kiwifruit are small this year and the forecast crop of 1.1 million trays is unlikely to be met.

Hawke’s Bay Fruitgrowers’ Association kiwifruit sector chairman Rod Wellwood said the region’s crop would be lucky to reach one million trays.

Mr Wellwood graded fruit from one Hawke’s Bay grower, at his Puketapu packhouse, that was so small most was rejected because it was too light. The grower’s forecast crop of 15,000 trays was unlikely to reach 10,000, Mr Wellwood said.

“In general, from what I’ve heard, fruit is small.”

However, the trend was not universal. Fruit from another grower had been bigger than ever, he said. Brian Calcinai, a picking contractor and New Zealand Fruitgrowers’ Federation director, said Gisborne and Nelson fruit was small this year.

Two environmental factors were probably to blame – cool weather at flowering in November, which depressed bee activity and cell division in young fruit, and hot weather in January, when evapotranspiration was high and fruit might not have been watered sufficiently.

Temperatures in January evaporated the equivalent of 4mm of rainfall some days.

Mr Wellwood said because kiwifruit vines had a large leaf area evapotranspiration in orchards was greater than for grass, probably equivalent to 6mm of rain on hot days.

He irrigated the equivalent to 12mm of rain a night to counteract the 11 days of the month when temperatures exceeded 30C.

The Kiwifruit Marketing Board’s final crop management scenario for Hawke’s Bay has been announced and reflects the increase in small sizes.

Packhouses are to retain 3.6 per cent of their total packout, with that volume to come out of the 42 size range.

Kiwifruit Marketing Board administration and export manager Bob Shaw said growers would still be paid for this fruit. The packhouse would receive nothing but would be able to sell it on the domestic market.

All regions outside the Bay of Plenty were “crop managing” size 42 fruit. Bay of Plenty packhouses were required to hold back some 39-sized fruit, the next size up from 42s.

Water stress caused by inadequate rainfall meant fruit from most regions was small this year. Only Kerikeri was consistently producing good sized fruit, he said.

Last year the industry was plagued with an overabundance of large kiwifruit.

Mr Shaw said the season had “spluttered” to a slow start, with only 25 per cent of the crop picked so far. Filling some export shipments had proved difficult.