Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Matthew Carter: Orange grower and Citrus NZ board member on the global shortages of orange juice

Transcript

Matthew Carter: Orange grower and Citrus NZ board member on the global shortages of orange juice · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: You may have noticed at the supermarket there's this orange
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: juice around. Fresh orange juice that is juice here is
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: made of a mix of local and imported products, most
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: coming from Brazil, and they're dealing with a disease impacting
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: their yield. It's spared for anyone trying to buy citrus products,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: but it's good for our local growers who's seen their
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: wholesale price almost double. Matt Carter is an orange grower
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: and a Citrus New Zealand board member met Good morning, morning, Ryan.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Thank you for being with me. I appreciate you being up,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: being up so early for us. Tell us how is
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: this affecting you guys?
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Sign Like you said, it's we get some juice concentrate
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: from all over the world, including Brazil, so it's actually
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: a global issue. So Brazil and Florida and a few
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: other countries are really being hammered by an insect and
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: a disease called citrus screening, and that's just really impacting
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: the availability of juice grade fruit. Brazil used to supply
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: about seventy percent of the world's juicing fruit, so it's
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: just having a big impact around the world for those
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: countries where we used to import it to make up
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: our own local juice as well.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Has cyclone Gabrielle hitting the impact on our output.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: It has a little bit. You know, a lot of
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: the juicing fruit does come from the Gisban region where
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: I am, and some of those blocks were badly affected.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: We say, having a bit of a more normal spring
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: and a bit more of a normal summer last year,
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: and those blocks are starting to recover, which is pretty good.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: How good is the shortage for your bottom line?
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: So those glowers that are growing juicing oranges, so that's
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: normally the Valencia orange, which we pick from around November
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: through to April May, so it's really a summer orange.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: It's been really good for those So in the past
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: we used to pack some of that fruit and send
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: it off to the supermarkets and that used to get
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: a good price, and the juice grade fruit would be
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: worth forty to fifty cents he and over the last
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: couple of years that's steadily been climbing and as you said,
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: that's nearly doubled in the last two years. So for
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: those growers that have got that fruit, and most citrus
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: growers have got a good mix of fruit, so lemons
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: or limes and oranges mandarins. Then that particular part of
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: their businesses has really turned up.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: In a word, what is the difference between juice grade
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: and just one you eat? Is the juice grade sweeter
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: or something?
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: No, it's just how it looks.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Oh, so the juicing ones are ugly.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Are they basically? Yeah? Yeah. So normally if we're sending
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: them off to the packhouse, they'll give them a wash
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: to clean up over the brushes and then grade them
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: out on cosmetics. So the best looking stuff goes off
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: to the supermarket, and then anything with defects or a
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: bit of a funny shape they go off to red
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: some companies Mett.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: Thank you for this, Met Carter, orange grower and Sitrus
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: New Zealand board member, putting all the ugly ones in
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  Speaker 1: the dark.
• 3:23
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• 3:26
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• 3:28
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• 3:30
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