Africa remains one of the largest buyers of South Africa apples and pears.
For that reason the continent will always remain a major focus for Freshgold SA Exports, says Alan Vorster, director of the African desk at Freshgold SA.
The Company, Freshgold SA Exports is a South African fruit exporter with offices in Spain and Mauritius.
Their main lines are topfruit, citrus, table grapes.
They also sell blueberries.
But haven’t started doing so for African clients.
Nevertheless, there have been some enquiries into South African blueberries from Nigeria, and they see room for blueberry growth in Ghana, Senegal, Kenya.
“There is a future for blueberries and strawberries, it won’t be long,”
Our Mauritius office already sells South African, Zimbabwean, Moroccan and Spanish blueberries to the Far East and the Middle East.)
“On apples we’ve had a good year,” notes Renier Grobbelaar, the director of procurement at FreshGold SA.
“We’re definitely up in volumes in totality.
The Langkloof had hail, which brought a correction, otherwise we would’ve been up even more.”
Many of our customers are moving to smaller fruit as their purchasing power erodes.
Our top fruit exports to Africa grow every year (as do our table grapes).
East Africa takes mostly bicoloured apples and Granny Smith.
West Africa is the main market for South Africa’s Golden Delicious.
Countries are very specific on the sizing.
Every country has its own fruit size requirements.
For example:
Ghana will take the larger apples while Nigeria likes it smaller.
Cameroon likes a count 150,” Alan explains.
“Buyers tell you that other counts sell with difficulty.”
Alan remarks that certain markets that used to take bigger apples, have over the years moved to smaller and smaller counts as purchase power comes under pressure.
