South African growers look to diversify

Fruit growers are said to be diversifying their farming businesses as production of avocados rise in South Africa’s Southern and Western Cape regions. The Cape regions have already reported the planting of 1,000ha of avocados – which is now contributing about 5 per cent of the national crop. Nothing seems to be impossible in modern fruit production as growers in different areas of South Africa explore new product categories across contrasting climatic regions. In some cases, this is driven by climate change, and in others new categories have just never previously been seriously considered. An example of this is the development of apple varieties which have low chilling requirements, enabling growers in the north of the country and even as far as Namibia to plant them. These also ripen earlier than traditional apple varieties and can therefore be marketed earlier than normal. The Cape has always been the dominant blueberry region and is likely to stay so for some time. However, in ...