Asia could become the largest export market for Chilean fresh fruit within 20 years. Yes, you heard me correctly, Asia could become the largest export market for Chilean fresh fruit within 20 years.
So says Ronald Bown, president of the Chilean Exporter’s Association, who made this startling announcement at last month’s Asiafruit Congress in Hong Kong. A short sentence of only 15 words seemed so momentous to me that, as the moderator of the three-day event organised by Asiafruit Magazine, I asked Mr Bown to repeat it, both to ensure that I and the rest of the large audience in the room had heard him correctly and to allow the significance of what he was saying to be properly understood.
In its relatively short history as an exporter of fresh fruit, Chile has made huge progress. I remember when in the 1980s and 1990s we wrote in Eurofruit Magazine about the emergence of this Latin American country. Our then editor, Linda Bloomfield, was a frequent visitor to Chile, meeting regularly with growers, exporters and industry leaders to report on its potential as a major supplier. Her contacts there haven’t diminished, indeed they have increased as this magazine has grown, spawning new titles which all report on developments in Chile throughout the season as well as special supplements on specific industry sectors. We’ve also taken our own Southern Hemisphere Congress to Chile twice in recent years.
Since the early 1980s, the country’s focus has been on North America and Europe, becoming the key supplier of millions of cartons of table grapes, apples, pears, kiwifruit, stonefruit and berries to retail buyers. In less than 20 years, it has become the largest supplier of fresh fruit from the Southern Hemisphere, overtaking established rivals such as South Africa, Argentina, New Zealand and Australia.
That’s not about to change any time soon. North America and Europe, huge markets of enormous influence, remain vitally important for Chile’s future in fresh produce. But as we discovered in the remainder of the 90-minute conference session about the country at Hong Kong’s Convention and Exhibition Centre last month, there is now a concerted effort on the part of the Chilean fresh fruit sector to shift its focus across the Pacific Ocean to Asia.
Conspicuous by its absence when the combined event started four years ago, Chile now commands a presence at the Hong Kong show that is expanding in line with the growth of the exhibition itself, up by 20 per cent in terms of visitors and 34 per cent in terms of exhibitors this year alone. Look beyond the conference room and trade show floor, however, and you begin to understand why Chilean exporters believe this market will dominate its future. Chile’s deputy farm minister Alvaro Cruzat was on hand this year to assess the potential himself and to visit several markets as the head of a delegation touring the region.
Aside from statistics you’ll read in the papers, the continent’s real potential is revealing itself in some surprising ways. Even the most cursory glance at the Asiafruit Congress programme shows you why: the emergence of 76 so-called ‘second tier’ cities in China alone; some 200m Muslim shoppers in Indonesia for whom fresh fruit and vegetables are a staple part of the diet; the great potential for exports and imports in a country such as the Philippines; and on it goes.
But, as Chileans are among the first to admit, focusing more on Asia is going to require a transformation in the way they operate. The market dominance of supermarkets in North America and Europe has shaped the supply chain, encouraging producers to forward-integrate their businesses to supply a relatively small range of high-quality products for shoppers who want safe food at value-for-money prices.
Asian consumers are no different, with perhaps an even sharper appreciation of quality and flavour than some tired palates in the US and Europe. Asia has not yet achieved the kind of homogeneity we find here in Europe or in the US, not least because the big retailers don’t yet have the whip hand. To do business with Asia, companies will need to rediscover what it means to sell, to trade, to market, to brand and, perhaps most importantly, to take risks.
