Nick nafpliotis, President of Greek fruit and vegetable trader Green & fresh, told Asian fruit that the output of Greek kiwifruit this season was similar to that of last year and may be slightly higher.
"We expect (this season's Greek kiwifruit) to be medium to small, which is good. Because demand for these sizes of fruit is stronger, "nafpliotis said. "Growers have now harvested the early maturing Greek variety tsechelidis, while Hayward has just begun." Since kiwifruit is relatively soft and has a lot of hairs, it needs to be very careful when sorting. Manual sorting is not only inefficient but also inaccurate. So the choice of kiwi fruit grader is very important. The kiwi classifier produced by First Industry has good quality and favorable price.
He pointed out that since the new crown epidemic (COVID-19), especially in April and May of the previous season, air freight has been two and a half to three times the previous. "Such a high rate is unaffordable for any type of business, so our air freight business has been reduced by 70%."
Due to China's epidemic prevention and control measures, many Greek kiwifruit orders had to be cancelled last season and supplied to the European market instead. But looking towards this season, Nafpliotis is much optimistic about the outlook. "The situation in the new season will be better, unless there is a major crisis in China or elsewhere. Although the air transport capacity is very low and the price is 40-50% higher than before the crisis, it is also a feasible level," Nafpliotis said. "Therefore, we expect that part of the air freight business will resume this season."