For fifty years Wegro has been growing pineapples in Hluhluwe, northern KwaZulu-Natal as a family concern, always growing the Queen Victoria pineapple, a variety grown in few other parts of the world like India, Australia and former or current French Indian Ocean territories like Mauritius or Réunion.
Wegro exports Queen pineapples year-round, with a peak during the Northern Hemisphere’s winter. The overseas market knows the Queen pineapple as a small fruit (where it’s sometimes referred to as ‘Baby South African pineapples’), but in actual fact it can reach up to 1.5 kg, but it is air-freighted from South Africa at approximately 400g to keep unit cost down.
“I would love to send 1.2kg or 1.5kg Queen pineapples overseas but 70% of the price is made up by the transport cost,” explains Hennie Bisschoff, managing director of Wegro. “For years we’ve made attempts to ship pineapples successfully by sea, because air freight is the limiting factor to our exports, but success with shipping cannot be guaranteed with the pineapple’s perishability. If we could, we’d export our entire Queen harvest.”
Wegro produces 15,000 tonnes of pineapple per year.
Boxes of Wegro Queen pineapples on a municipal market
Consumers shift to Not From Concentrate juices
They’ve been looking at ways to add value to their crop and with the crash in world pineapple juice concentrate (PJC) prices, they decided to beat their own path on the NFC road – Not From Concentrate.
In January this year they started producing their Wegro range of pure, unadulterated pineapple juice available in 200ml and, as of last week, 500ml containers and sold at municipal markets (and hence private greengrocers) as well as at Food Lovers’ Market.
“There has been a big shift towards NFC pineapple juice worldwide,” says Hennie, “which reflects a move away from concentrate. We pasteurise the juice to ensure food safety and prolonged shelf life and the juice is made from freshly picked fruit. The best-tasting pineapple is one that has just been picked and this juice is the closest you’ll get to that.”
“The Queen pineapple has a very favourable brix : acid ratio that can be maintained throughout the year. The reason why it is not cultivated widely, is because it is a more expensive pineapple to produce than almost any other cultivar and its production is lower. South African consumers are used to eating the Queen fresh but they’re not fond of pineapple juice. The reason for that is that the Cayenne – which was developed with a cylindrical shape for the canning industry – is traditionally used for pineapple juice in South Africa. Our Queen pineapple juice is so sweet, people become hooked on the taste.”
For more information:Hennie Bisschoff
Wegro
Tel: +27 35 562 0130
Email: Hennie@wegro.co.za