South Africa’s largest fruit-marketing company, Tru-Cape Fruit Marketing, has struck a deal with Chinese government agencies to produce a range of varieties of apples and pears in the Western Cape.
The company has been awarded the exclusive rights to produce six apple varieties of the Fuji strain in SA for 20 years by the Shaanxi province agricultural research agency.
It has reached a similar agreement with the Hebei provincial agricultural research agency to produce four varieties of pears such as Ya Li pears.
Tru-Cape is the marketing arm of producers Ceres Fruit Growers, Kromco and Two-a-Day and claims to export 55 per cent of the top fruit grown in the Western Cape.
It said the the deal could open up new export markets and the new strains will enable growers to achieve significantly higher yields.
Under the deal, it is reported that farmers would have to pay a one-off fee of R5 for every tree grown from the new strains. The majority of that fee would go to the two Chinese research agencies. Tru-Cape would collect the balance and use part of it to market the fruit, said ceo Charles Hughes.
He added that Tru-Cape hopes the first fruit from the new strains will be available within the next four years.
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