15 Aug 2016

Zespri to resume kiwifruit shipments to China

2:35 pm on 15 August 2016

Zespri will resume shipping kiwifruit to China on Friday after a temporary halt in supplies due to a fungus found in a routine inspection, the company says.

The fungus causes fruit to rot in long-term storage but has no food safety implications.

Zespri said it had revised its pre-export checking processes, which had been approved by the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI).

MPI was advising the Chinese authorities.

The kiwifruit marketer said suppliers were rechecking fruit destined for China under the new processes before shipping resumed.

Sales of kiwifruit that had been cleared into China continued as normal, and supply was on track to exceed last year's volume with another 7 million trays forecast to be exported there this season, it said.

It said the fungus had only affected about 2 percent of the fruit that had arrived in China to date.

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