What was it all about?

This program supported the Australian summerfruit industry to maintain and develop their export markets and help individual growers to take advantage of existing, new and emerging trade opportunities.

Challenge

Market access and market development are the two highest priorities for the Australian summerfruit industry, with a goal of summerfruit exports reaching 40,000 tonnes by 2030.

Leading into this program, the Australian summerfruit industry had achieved records in volume and value:

• During the 2018/19 season, the industry exported 23,013 tonnes of nectarines, peaches, plums and apricots worth $88.95 million, achieving a unit value of A$3.87. This was a new record result for volume, value and unit value.
• During the 2019/20 season, the industry exported 21,269 tonnes worth A$89.10m. While the result was 7.7 per cent lower than 2018/19 the unit values were nine per cent higher and the overall value increased by 0.2 per cent.

This program aimed to achieve an incremental growth of exports of 1700 tonnes per annum (taking the exports from 23,000 tonnes to 28,100 tonnes) and achieving access to at least two new export destinations.

Response

During the program, the project team:

• Maintained and further developed the Chinese market that was focussed a robust supply chain to ensure importers and retailers received consistent fruit every year.
• Maintained and expanded the markets in Thailand, Taiwan, Indonesia, India, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and the Philippines by focussing on the development of the export capability of the Australian industry.
• Worked towards achieving market access to Vietnam, USA, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand.

Benefit

This program covered the seasons from 2020/21 to 2023/24. During that period, the industry faced a number of major issues including the on-set of the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic and devastating weather conditions in the 2022/23 season.

As a result of these ‘events’, exports declined in volume and total value, but the unit price continued to reach high levels. 2023/24 saw exports rebound and while not back to the record of 2018/19 in volume, the value of sales reached a record level, and the unit price was stable in comparison with 2022/23.

While the volume levels declined across the 2021/22 and 2022/23 seasons there was still robustness within the export supply chain to maintain exports and in some instances grow the markets. The fact that in 2023/24 exports rebounded strongly (43 per cent up) highlights the robust and resilient nature of the Australian Stonefruit Industry.

In addition to achieving these records Summerfruit Australia, through engagement with and assistance of the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF) achieved market access for Australian peaches and nectarines to Vietnam in February 2022. Further to that, negotiations for plums to Vietnam progressed during the latter period of the project and the industry is hopefully of achieving access in the second half of 2024.