Welcome to the Sept-Oct Newsletter,
The 2019 export season has so far been a season of firsts and exciting opportunities for the Just Avocados team and our growers. We made the first commercial export shipment in the industry of New Zealand Avocados to China, we established a direct Australian retail vendor code through JH Leavy & Co, we have a newly established export clearance facility at JH Leavy & Co, and have fantastic support from our Asian customer base. It’s an often overlooked point that on a percentage of market share basis we are, among our competitors, the largest supporter of the emerging markets.
As most of you will be aware, we have hit a challenging part of the season as combined New Zealand and Australian volumes have reached levels that have put the Australian market under pressure. We are managing this to ensure that we achieve the optimum outcome for our growers. The next three weeks will be critical in managing the outcome and I thank those that I have spoken to with regards to harvest planning for your consideration and support of the necessary changes we have made. Moving or slowing down harvest is not something that we enjoy doing but at times it is essential to ensure we manage a softening or under pressure market.
We had great turn outs at both of our last two field days in the Far North and BOP, and thank you to John and Marion Williams from the Far North and Simon and Lizzette Turnbull from Katikati for hosting the field days. Our next field day will be in Whangarei – we are in the process of identifying an orchard, if you are keen on hosting a field day please let us know.
We will be holding the Just Avocados Trust Ltd AGM on the 29th of November this year which will follow on to a Christmas BBQ. We encourage all growers from all regions to join us. Time and date to be confirmed – keep an eye on your email inbox for the details!
In this edition of the newsletter you will find an update from John on what’s happening across the growing regions, Erica will cover what to do in the orchard during spring, a guest contributor Mike Sim from Biobees shares the benefits of bumble bees as pollinators, and Jacob shares the details of our first commercial shipment to China.
Finally, last month we farewelled Greg O’Carroll, our long-standing BOP Grower Services Rep. Greg had been with Just Avocados from its inception. I thank Greg for his high level of service offered and commitment to the company over the last eight years. We are in the process of recruiting for this role and will be announcing a replacement shortly.
Regards,
Jarrod