It looks to be a bright season for British Columbia (BC) apple exports, the province that is responsible for 90 percent of Canadian apple exports. Last year, production of export quality apples was down due to forest fires, smoke, and a mid-October cold snap. However, this year the situation looks much brighter. "Despite a few days of extreme temperatures back in June, we are blessed with the best apple crop in years,” says Ricky Chong with Sutherland, S.A. The high temperatures in summer caused some sunburn and impacted sizing profiles with 60 percent of the crop being in the 72/80/88s range. “However, beautiful, cold, fall weather and the use of our Extenday reflective ground covers will result in excellent export quality product.”
The 2021/2022 has officially kicked off with Sutherland’s crew inspecting apple orchards from the southern part of BC to the northern apple growing region, spanning 120 km (75 miles). The team is seeing very consistent quality. “Export quality is up significantly from last year and we are anticipating this year’s apple exports to be three times bigger than last season,” Chong commented. “With this high quality, we expect to continue shipping through the month of May 2022.”
Ambrosia apple orchard with Extenday ground covers.
Ambrosia and Honeycrisp
Canada is world-famous for both the Ambrosia and Honeycrisp apple varieties. “These varieties thrive in the Canadian climate, producing the highest export quality,” Chong shared. “Demand strengthens each year due to our focus on improving export quality and utilizing optical sorting at our facilities.” Canadian apples inspected, packed, and exported by Sutherland mainly make their way over to Vietnam, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Cambodia. Along with the Ambrosia and Honeycrisp varieties, a limited supply of Brookfield Gala, Granny Smith, Cripps Pink, and Red & Golden Delicious apples are packed in Sutherland’s Golden Dragon and Smiling Buddha labels.
Brookfield Gala and Golden Delicious apples.
It’s the two original Canadian varieties, Ambrosia and Honeycrisp, that are the most popular varieties in demand. The New Tree Fruit Varieties Development Council (NTFVDC) offers promotional funding for the Ambrosia variety, which helps growers and shippers target new countries, promote in-store sampling, and develop new business. The program is funded by industry levies on BC Ambrosia apples and support from the government. “It is a great program that helps and encourages Canadian growers to grow some of the best quality fruit in the world,” said Chong.
Ambrosia variety.
In-house logistics team
Despite the global shipping challenges, Chong is confident about the company’s ability to export three times more volume this year. “We have our own Sutherland Logistics Team that manages our logistics quite effectively,” he said. “We offer door-to-door service, which our customers love.” Both container capacity and transit times have been within permissible parameters during the pandemic and the company isn’t seeing any drastic challenges. “Everything we’ve run into so far, could be solved with creative thinking.”
“We differentiate ourselves by offering our clients one-stop shopping, which includes our QC team members inspecting orchards, taking care of packing, quality control, as well as all logistics.” Sutherland, S.A. has been exporting fresh fruit for over 25 years and is always looking to develop new long-term business with retail and wholesale clients. Its selection of export quality fruit out of Canada, the US, China, Australia, Chile, and Spain continues to be expanded.
For more information:
Ricky Chong
Sutherland S.A. Produce, Inc.
Ph: +1 (403) 616-1977
rick@lapincherry.com
www.cherries.global/apples