Mango Road, the wholly owned export company of Australian mango producer Manbulloo Ltd, has shipped its first trial seafreight container of R2E2 mangoes to Shanghai, China.
It is estimated around 8.5 tonnes of mangoes were sent in the controlled atmosphere (CA) container.
The fruit was one of the first batches to go through Manbulloo's newvapour heat treatment facilityat their Horseshoe Lagoon packhouse in Giru, North Queensland.
The mangoes were loaded into a Maersk CA container on 6 January and were then transported from Townsville to Brisbane Port before setting sail for Shanghai on 10 January.
The container arrived on 26 January and first inspections showed it had travelled perfectly, arriving at precisely the correct colour stage.
A second container is due to arrive in Shanghai today, just in time for Chinese New Year celebrations on 14 February.
Although this is the third year Manbulloo has shipped mangoes to China, this year marks the first time the company has been able to use seafreight.
Manbulloo Ltd managing director Marie Piccone told Fruitnet.com the seafreight trial was an important development for her company.
'This is the second year we've sent mangoes to Japan, and the third year we've sent mangoes to China, but the first time we've used seafreight,' she said.
'We've been getting a better understanding of what our customer's want.
'We've got some great partners in Japan and China and we'd really like to expand the Australian mango eating experience to consumers in both countries,' she said.
