Australian Table Grape Association CEO Jeff Scott says the first shipments to Korea have been received “extremely well” and hopes to make the most of the short free trade period.
“We hope to send 50-80 containers to Korea this year,” he says. “Bear in mind we only have a small window of opportunity this year, starting now until the end of April.”
The current Free Trade Agreement period only lasts from the 1st of December till the 30th of April and, when export protocols are factored in, that means the final shipments have to be sent by mid-April.
Mr Scott says the ATGA would like to see the Free Trade Agreement extended to give growers a longer export period.
“Because we have to send fruit by sea and it takes 18-20 days to get there, we have to stop shipments around 18th of April. If fruit arrives on 1st of May, it gets a 45% tariff,” he says.
“We’re trying to extend the agreement at the moment. We’d really like to see it extended to the end of May or June.”
The Korean markets have shown strong demand for Australian Crimson Seedless grapes, and Mr Scott says there’s also potential for Thompson Seedless to do well there.
“They love the taste of our Thompsons, particularly the sweetness, but Australia produces slightly gold-colours Thompsons because of the high sugar content, and Koreans are used to quite dark green fruit,” he says.
“So we need to educate them that if they want very sweet Thompsons then they need to look for the gold Australian Thompsons, and we’re working on that.”
He says the season has been good for Australian grapes, with well formed bunches, great colour and exceptional sweetness helping to produce strong prices in export markets and domestically.
“We’ve had nice dry days and cool nights, which brings out the sugar and colour in the Crimson,” he says.
“We’re looking forward to good season and we’ve got strong demand, so we’re expecting good returns to growers too.”
For more information:
Jeff Scott
Australian Table Grape Association
Tel: +61 340 090 127
Email: atga@ncable.com.au
www.australiangrapes.com.au