cadamia industry is making changes to its business model to meet a specific demand from its major Chinese customers.Marketing development manager Lynne Ziehlke says macadamia imports to China, known to be the world's second largest consumer of the nut, increased by 29 per cent last year. She says the 70 per cent of the Australian crop that goes to export is mostly in kernel form, but China wants the nuts kept in their shells.
"The way our industry operates has been about really growing and producing really high quality kernel product, and we're already making significant moves in a very short period of time to supply very good, high quality in-shell product," she said. "We have to develop systems around making sure that we can still dry it down and ship it in a way that will deliver that quality."
The Australian Macadamia Society estimates this year's crop will be up between 5 and 10 per cent.
