Australian pear exports have followed a similar course to the country’s apple trade over the past decade, dropping from 18,000 tonnes in 2003 to 6,000 tonnes in 2013.
Indonesia, together with Canada and New Zealand, has, however, remained a key taker of the fruit, and this year Apple and Pear Australia (APAL) is spearheading a push to revive trade into the emerging South East Asian country.
“Australian growers have a long history of supplying Packham pears to Indonesia. No other European pear-style pear producer is closer to Indonesia than Australia, and yet we often overlook this country with its huge and increasingly affluent population,” said APAL’s export development manager Claire Fitchett. “We think now is a good time to actively re-engage in this important market and remind consumers what makes Australian pears special.”
APAL is working with Jakarta-based marketing consultancy MoreFresh Asia Pacific to run point-of-sale promotions in leading retail chains in the Indonesian capital, including Hero supermarket, Matahari Hypermart and Ranch Market.
“We want to regain some market share and significantly grow our export volumes. We’re focused on Indonesia as a priority market for Australian pears given they already know and trust our product,” she said.
Fitchett said a range of pears will be offered for taste-testing to showcase the diversity of Australia’s offer, while value buy offers and educational material including recipes will be the focus of the promotions. “We’ll also be teaming up with other Australian food organisations to cross-promote our products, such as meat and dairy.”
In addition to the retail promotions, APAL will take a delegation of Australian pear growers on an export study tour to Jakarta next month, and then onto Singapore for Food and Hotel Asia.
Only this week, APAL coordinated a pomefruit buyers’ programme as part of the Victorian government’s Food and Beverage Trade Week. “Victoria produces 90 per cent of Australia’s pears, so this is a great fit,” said Fitchett. “We’ve got fresh produce buyers from across Asia participating, including a strong contingent of pomefruit buyers from the Philippines and Vietnam. These are markets Australia has don’t much pomefruit trade with so we’re looking forward to exploring new opportunities.”
Indeed, Fitchett believes there is good potential to develop a following for Australian pears in Asia beyond Indonesia.
“Whilst some Asian markets have traditionally wanted only composite grade fruit, we see a demand from premium outlets looking for first grade pears,” she said. “For instance, Thai food retailer Tops recently ran a promotion for premium Australian Packham pears and quickly ran out of stock–a great sign for us that consumers love Australian pears.”
Despite a lack of familiarity with European-style pears among many Asian consumers, Fitchett says there is interest in the Australian offer.
“Red-skinned varieties like Red Anjou, Corella and Red Sensation are in demand,” she said. “Australia has a good range of pear varieties and we are excited about some of the new varieties that will come online in the next few years.”
