"We are receiving our first Cox and Gala just now and we are very happy with the quality," explained Patrick Meikle commercial manager at Golden Bay Fruit. "Our volumes have been affected this year by hail storms which hit the orchards last December, we lost around 20% of our crop."
Golden Bay Fruit grows a quarter of the New Zealand volume of Cox apples as well as Galas, Braeburn and Pink Lady. The company exports worldwide, including Asia , US, EU and UK.
"European markets are reasonably strong, UK is being held back a bit as stocks are more than previous years."
The exchange rate between the NZ dollar and the pounds/Euro is not particularly favourable for exporters at the moment but according to Patrick they will export the same volumes to Europe as last year.
"Other markets have strong pricing such as Asia for example, and the US is also strong, they are looking for big sizes and a lot of New Zealand apples will go there this year," according to Patrick.
For more information:
Patrick Meikle
Golden Bay Fruit
patrick@goldenbayfruit.com