Alibaba sold one million Mexican avocados on Black Friday via its online sales platform Tmall.
The figure was revealed by Adrián Iturbide, president of Mexican avocados exporter association Apeam.
This was the second consecutive year that Apeam and Alibaba carried out the joint Black Friday promotion and the avocado association said it hoped to repeat the campaign in 2018.
Apeam welcomed a recent decision by the Chinese government to cut import tariffs on Mexican avocados from 10 per cent to 7 per cent. The move, which came into effect on 1 December, narrows the gap between Mexico and its Latin American competitors Chile and Peru, who pay no import duties under the terms of their Free Trade Agreements with China.
Chile displaced Mexico to become the top supplier of avocados to China this year after shipments jumped 76.5 per cent in volume and 88.1 per cent in value between January and September.
A number of new suppliers are poised to enter the Chinese market as demand continues to grow, among them Colombia and New Zealand.
Efforts are reportedly underway to set up large-scale avocado production in China. The move follows earlier trial plantings of Hass avocados in southern China during the 1980s. Although successful the venture was short-lived due to lack of demand.
