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“Often times, particularly the early ones will set the tone for the season, so let’s get it off to a strong start.”
Higgins also points to new low-chill cherry varieties that could open up entirely new production regions such as Mexico.
“Many of them are typically in drier parts of the world, so if you’re in a part of the world that doesn’t have late spring rains, the whole consideration of fruit cracking is taken off the table,” he says.
The cherry breeder agrees there is a clear
parallel with what is taking place in berries. “We are now producing a much higher percentage of our total supply within trucking distance of the market,” says Soren Bjorn, president of Driscoll’s of the Americas based in Watsonville, CA. “This is a huge development in blueberries, really driven by the Australians with people like Costa Group, Mountain Blue and OzBlu, where they have developed these low-chill, almost no-chill blueberry genetics. The way you get the best result is you select in the environment where
PHOTOS COURTESY OF INTERNATIONAL FRUIT GENETICS AND DRISCOLL’S
Sweet Sapphires are one of International Fruit Genetics leading sellers.
Driscoll’s says there has been a shift to bring back flavor as opposed to high yield, which has been easier to achieve with blackberries because of higher margins.
you’re going to produce, instead of selecting in a proxy environment and trying to make the varieties work.”
Like his peers in the vegetable sector, Bjorn adds that in the past berry breeding was very focused on high yield, but a shift has been underway to bring back flavor.
In blackberries this has been easier to achieve because margins have been rather high, but in strawberries the task is more challenging, and raspberry improvements have been more recent.
“I think you’re going to see another revo- lution in that for raspberries where the flavors are really going to improve, and for the Cali- fornia strawberry industry that’s what they need to do.” pb
36 / MAY 2019 / PRODUCE BUSINESS
EDITOR’S NOTE: There is much more to be written about varietal development, so if you wish to contribute to the dialogue, please email us at info@producebusiness.com