Growers tackle core concepts

Nelson

Pipfruit growers have emerged optimistic from their annual conference in Nelson, reports Laura Basham.

Growers could have been forgiven for rushing out of the Pipfruit NZ conference in horror.

Calls for carbon footprinting their product, stringent testing for chemical residues and predictions that climate change will make Nelson too wet and Hawke's Bay too chilly to grow apples are enough to make growers wonder why they should bother.

However, they have one good reason: returns for the latest season are looking good enough to put smiles on their faces.

Last year, average returns to growers were $16.30 for an 18kg box of braeburn, while this year they are $23 to $25, a much more sustainable level.

Sustainability was the focus of the conference as the pipfruit industry works on ensuring its future.

Pipfruit New Zealand chief executive Peter Beaven says the industry has good stories to tell.

Its Apple Futures project, producing low-residue fruit to gain a lead in the world market, is the first chapter.

The second chapter is about carbon footprinting, another move to establish the industry's green credentials.

Working out what sustainability is about is a debate in itself.

World fruit market analyst Des O'Rourke, who came to the conference from Washington state, is sceptical about some concepts of sustainability.

For example, some said that sustainable agriculture must be self-sustaining, which meant a community of farmers would be expected to provide all its own needs, he said.

That could mean they could not use petroleum products from Saudi Arabia or export lamb to North America, he said.

Nelson growers would only be allowed to grow apples for Nelson and could not export, he said.

Quoting economists David Pannell and Steven Schilizzi, he said: "Sustainability is at once extremely important and practically useless."

However, he said while they might be right, agriculture could not opt out of the sustainability debate.

He urged the pipfruit industry to develop its own sustainable programme that it could defend; otherwise, it would be in danger of others imposing their own impractical and uneconomic ideas.

O'Rourke was heartened at New Zealand's proactive, more realistic strategies.

Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry policy analyst Alison Watson said it was taking a bottom-up approach to carbon footprinting, saying it had to be usable by the people producing the product or it would not work.

She told the conference that the food miles issue had morphed into a wider debate on the total carbon footprint of a product from cradle to grave.

New Zealand could not ignore increasing market demand for carbon footprint information on primary products, she said.

The British Government was already doing it with comparative studies, including one looking at the environmental impact of New Zealand apple imports compared with UK apples.

Three processes were under way to come up with a carbon footprinting standard - a UK standard, a World Resources Institute standard and another through the International Standards Organisation.

To questions from growers of, "Why bother with carbon footprinting?", she said the issue was not going to go away.

"You need to be able to tell a story about how you are committed to doing something to reduce your carbon footprint," Ms Watson said.

Consumers were not so interested in a number showing a carbon footprinting rating, but they wanted to see a commitment to doing something.

"They want to know you are trying to be a good supplier," she said.

Those who did not bother might come up against market access issues.

Research had also shown that consumers did not think it should cost any more - it was just part of production.

If growers wanted confirmation of that, they got it from UK supermarket chain Marks and Spencer top-fruit technical manager Andrew Mellonie.

Being carbon-friendly by using video to speak at the conference, he said the New Zealand pipfruit industry needed to focus on carbon footprinting and its Apple Futures programme for residue-free fruit.

However, Mellonie said Marks and Spencer would not charge more for lower carbon footprint products.

MAF is working in partnership with the primary sector to produce a carbon footprint strategy and Pipfruit NZ plans to put in a bid for the next round of greenhouse gas footprinting project funding.

It is just another challenge for an industry that strives to be innovative. The dramatic reduction in the number of growers from 1424 four years ago to 436 follows a number of poor seasons, although the remaining growers control more production.

Europe is still the most critical market for the industry, hence the drive towards sustainability to meet that market's demands.

However, growers questioned whether the push to satisfy low-residue-fruit markets in Europe was putting growth markets in China and Japan at risk.

Their concerns were highlighted with the experience this season of four exporters being suspended after the discovery of woolly apple aphids in consignments of Hawke's Bay apples sent to China.

Hawke's Bay had a bad year for woolly apple aphids after a change in spray for codlin moth to satisfy the Taiwan market resulted in parasitoids being destroyed and the woolly apple moth population exploding.

The biosecurity failure has been taken seriously because of its potential to jeopardise the Chinese and other export markets.

However, that pest issue is unrelated to Apple Futures, which so far is regarded as a success and will be expanded in Nelson this coming season.

The industry is also looking at switching to using the gas phosphine as an alternative fumigant to methyl bromide, and trial results reported to the conference were seen as promising.

The issue the pipfruit industry keenly wants to sort out is its access to Australia.

Pipfruit NZ chairman Ian Palmer quoted Alan Oxley, of trade consultants ITS Global, saying: "Australia's case before the WTO into apple imports from NZ is weak and probably will be defeated."

To which Mr Palmer told the conference, "There is no `probably' about it.

"Who said Kiwis don't have teeth? I know Kiwi apple growers do."