Growing and exporting the Australian mango was the dream of John Morton and family of Queensland based EMU exports.
The story began in 2000, when a friend of the Morton family introduced them to some Vietnamese government officials and the chief of South Vietnam's agricultural institute, Dr Chau, in Khanh Hoa province. Over subsequent visits to the country, the Mortons developed relationships with the officials and with those in the Vietnamese mango industry.
This led, in 2002, to the Vietnamese government granting a licence to the Morton's to establish a 100% foreign owned investment company. The licence was granted subject to the company charter, which specifies the the development of an export mango industry for Vietnamese growers,using Australian R2E2 and Kensington Pride mangoes varieties. An agreement was also put in place whereby the growers receive training in cultivation techniques.
Just one year later, 2000 grafted mango trees were growing under government supervision. The operation grew from there, until, by 2006 the company was granted 100ha of prime cultivation land with a 50 year lease.
Additionally, 6.8ha of land was provided for the establishment of a 5,000 metre square packing house and housing for members of the Morton family who live in Vietnam.
The development continued with cold rooms being installed at the packing shed and the construction of a large frozen mango cheek production line, which should see processing of cheeks taking place for export to Australia this coming season.
Currently half of the 100ha provided is in production, though volumes are backed up by supplies from a local network of over 100 growers.
last season saw 250 tons of R2E2 mangoes exported under the project, to the EU, the Middle East, South East Asia, Hong Kong and Indonesia.
This year's crop is expected to be in the region of 500 tons.
For more information:
Fred Durham
Global Fresh with Global Fresh Marketing Pty Ltd
Tel: +61 2 6628 8927
Mob: +61 438 020 393
[email protected]
www.globalfresh.com.au
