In New Zealand, the gross saleable production of golden kiwis is almost double that of green kiwis, so it is understandable that producers push to grow the former, although there are specific quotas. The topic was discussed on 7th April in Cesena during a convention attended by Mirco Montefiori, technical manager for Newplant. He worked in New Zealand for many years and returned to Italy 18 months ago.
Mirco Montefiori at the convention held 7th April 2018
"Golden kiwis are becoming popular once again because of their high gross saleable production. But I believe things are also destined to pick up for green kiwis. There is a lot of room for new varieties that meet consumer needs. However, the genetic improvement of the green varieties has not brought about great changes, and the most popular variety continues to be the original one."
Due to the weather of the past few months, with frost, sunshine, rain and snow, the PSA risk is rather high. Montefiori is sure the disease will appear again in kiwi orchards.
"Anti-rain nets work well against PSA as they protect trees from hail and low temperatures. They are not a solution, but they help maintain the incidence of the disease low."
As regards volumes and commercialisation, Montefiori stressed that ripening must be monitored per orchard rather than per company. This is because ripening levels can change from one plot to the next even within the same company. The age of the trees, exposure and soil are enough to change everything.
"Zespri was the first to introduce the dry matter parameter as an index to assess the quality of the fruit. And there's an incentive for all the batches that reach a certain level of dry matter. Brix levels, hardness and colour are no longer enough to determine top quality fruit."