Cherry Growers Australia and a number of growers and exporters will be heading back to Hong Hong for Asia Fruit Logistica 2014. They can be found on the Australia Fresh Stand and around the trade show.
Simon Boughey CEO of the Cherry Growers Australia said the industry will be looking at expanding Australia's cherry exports into new markets as well as growing existing ones. "We have developed a new Biosecurity Management Program (BMP) and measures to get into more markets. We will also be looking at increasing our exports into protocol and non-protocol markets."
For example at the moment Australia can export to China and Thailand but only from a few growing regions . Boughey and the team at Cherry Growers Australia want to give all growing regions across the country the opportunity to have more access to these markets.
At the moment 95% of Australia's cherries are airfreighted and the industry wants to achieve 100% airfreight in the coming years to all markets. If methods as out lined in the BMP are accepted, building on what is already in place, such as the systems approaches, pest free places of production, sugar floatation systems and improved end point treatments were accepted it would mean the cherries could be on the consumer's table within 72 hours in any market once picked in the orchard.
Boughey adds that the global market is big and growers must tailor the product to suit these markets and against out key competitors in Chile, Argentina, New Zealand and South Africa, who are all expanding their production and focussing on exports into Asia too.
