South Africa to ignite dragon fruit with trademark
by Market Insider
Tuesday, 21 Jun. 2016
A new project in South Africa aims to establish a thriving dragon fruit industry with the nation’s first trademarked varieties.
A South African company has registered 14 varieties of the tropical fruit also known as pitahaya which are considered superior by far to the cultivars currently under small-scale production in the country.
Dragon fruit is a very big cultivar in the Far East but, according to the South African producer, large part of the product actually into the market is sometimes watery and rather tasteless while the new interesting selections developed in the U.S. would be absolutely delicious.
The new varieties have been registered under a trademark and plant material for 1.000 hectares will be released to selected growers; a new marketing company has been created and, for every hectare, growers will be given a share in the company for the duration of the project having also control of their own destiny through representatives within the company.
Not only the fruit under the trademark will be sold but also value-added products such as dried fruit, drinks and face creams.
While the project is starting on a small scale, the number of growers may end up being in the hundreds with farms concentrated in the Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces and, to a smaller extent, in parts of KwaZulu-Natal and frost-free areas of the Eastern Cape.
Exports will not begin for at least a couple of years to allow reaching adequate production levels but the key target markets have been already identified and include European countries like the U.K., France, Germany and the Netherlands.
It interesting to observe there would be no need of infrastructural development to support the industry as the product can ‘ride on the back’ of what is already established in South Africa where all the infrastructure for packing, processing and shipping are already on place for bananas, avocados and other tropical fruits; dragon fruits can be packed on the same lines of avocados or mangoes, for example, and requires the same cold storage regime to go to Europe.
Although the project is in its early days, it is considered as having a big potential in the country where there are currently no more than two dozen hectares of the fruit under production. The project expects to become member of the South African Subtropical Growers’ Association (Subtrop) which represents avocado, mango, lychee and macadamia nut producers and plans to have a thriving industry in 10 years as hectares under the project will be 1.000 with an option for another 1.000.
Dragon fruit can become definitely an alternative crop for subtropical areas in South Africa; for now the main focus will be to build brand confidence among consumers and growers.
Source: Freshfruitportal