11 Feb 2014

Good avocado season

7:59 am on 11 February 2014

The avocado industry is approaching the end of its export season and it has been a good one, with strong demand and a better supply compared with last year.

Industry body New Zealand Avocados is forecasting three million trays of export fruit this season, each weighing bout 5.5kg, with another 1.5 million trays going into the domestic market.

Chief executive Jen Scoular says this season has been an average one in production terms but the volume of fruit is still much higher than the 2.6 million trays produced last year.

Of this year's harvest, 2.4 million trays will go to Australia while 1.5 million are destined for the domestic market.

"The Australian market has been very strong. We sometimes have a blip in demand in Australia just before Christmas, with competition from summerfruit, but we've had a very strong demand right throughout our summer ... in Australia, and prices have held up very well for us," Ms Scoular says.

New Zealand Avocados also exports to Japan, Singapore, Korea and Thailand, with strong growth in the latter after a change in its regulations means it no longer accepts Australian avodacos.

"Our avocados certainly filled that gap very well," she says.