"A varietal renewal in fruit trees is urgent"
As a pending task of the Ñuble fruit sector, the president of the Ñuble farmers, Álvaro Gatica, described the introduction of new varieties that allow satisfying the requirements of the destination markets and the complexities of the long trips from the Chilean ports.
The helmsman of the Association of Farmers of Ñuble argued that "for example, in blueberries, there are varieties that simply do not want to buy, then we have to vary, rather than thinking about growing on the surface. In certain crops, such as berries, in which there is no labor; I always tell the farmers that before deciding to plant more blueberries, see if they have people, because the investments are too large and then they can not harvest. "
He added: "I would focus today specifically on renewing varieties that are already simply obsolete, that have 20-25 years and the market does not want them, and change to varieties that are asking for them today, instead of continuing to increase surface area. Today we can have double the production per hectare in kilos, because there are more producing varieties and of better quality, then we will continue increasing our production, but not necessarily increasing the surface, because there is no labor, unless we allocate amount of berries for frozen; unfortunately the frozen is not a very good price, and there it is necessary to see if it agrees or not ".
The leader maintained that the number of orchards in Ñuble with obsolete varieties is very large. "We are talking about gardens that were planted 15-20 years ago, and if not all, I would say that at least half are obsolete, and it's not just that they pay you less, it's that they do not buy them, they serve only for frozen, and the problem of frozen is that the price is very unstable, last year the price was horrible, but the ancestor was very good, then a lot of fresh fruit was destined to frozen, because it is like a commodity, depends on the stock there is, however, fresh fruit can not be saved. "
Gatica said that the taste of international consumers is not the only factor to be taken into account for Ñuble fruit producers and the rest of the country. "There are varieties that do not have 'legs', as we say, to get outside, to get to China or Europe, they are good varieties, very rich, but they do not get there because the trip is very long, it is what is called the postharvest life ".
Research
The union leader argued that the varieties used in Chile were not developed in the country, were created in other countries and introduced in the territory, therefore, were not designed for the local exporting reality.
"All these varieties come from outside, there are no Chilean varieties, neither the INIA nor other research centers have been concerned to make Chilean varieties, that can withstand a long trip, that adapt to our climate. It is very different that we bring varieties from the United States, that work very well there, with another climate, and that they are consumed there. Then, we bring them here and they behave differently. "
Therefore, the entrepreneur said that research plays a very important role. "The Catholic University has been doing something with the raspberry, they got three varieties, which are the 'santa' (Santa Teresa, Santa Clara and Santa Catalina), which are Chilean, and I understand that they have been relatively good, and that is what we have to do, but there is no research on that, we bring everything from outside, all varieties. "
Source: ladiscusion.cl
ARTÍCULOS RELACIONADOS
