Kiwifruit or kiwi is a major horticultural export earner for New Zealand. New Zealand developed the first commercially viable kiwifruit and developed export markets, creating the demand for the fruit that exists today. Today New Zealand is the third largest kiwifruit producing country, next to China and Italy, and holds approximately 30% of the market share. In the 2008–2009 season the value of New Zealand kiwifruit exports was NZ$1.45 billion.
Origin of the fruit
Cultivation of the fuzzy kiwifruit spread from China in the early 20th century, when seeds were introduced to New Zealand by Mary Isabel Fraser, the principal of Whanganui Girls' College who had been visiting mission schools in Yichang, China. The seeds were planted in 1906 by a Whanganui nurseryman, Alexander Allison, with the vines first fruiting in 1910. A New Zealand horticulturalist developed the well-known green kiwifruit in Avondale, New Zealand, around 1924. This well known green kiwifruit were later renamed "Hayward" as a tribute to its creator, Hayward Wright.
Origins of the industry
The first commercial planting of Chinese gooseberries occurred in 1937 by the orchardist Jim MacLoughlin. He found that the vines were low maintenance and fruited well. By 1940, MacLoughlin purchased more property for Chinese gooseberry production. MacLoughlin's truck was commandeered for army use during the outbreak of war and as a result, he was forced to sell his property and enter into a shared cropping arrangement with another farmer. In 1955, MacLoughlin bought out his partner, purchasing his land back along with an additional 38 acres and planting it all to Chinese gooseberries. During the war around 550 cases of the fruit were marketed each season with the fruit proving popular with American servicemen in New Zealand. This provided the opportunity for the previously domestically-consumed fruit industry to expand by exporting to an international market.
Initial growth of the export market
In 1952, MacLoughlin approached the New Zealand Fruit Federation who agreed to facilitate the shipping and marketing of the fruit to United States markets, this was New Zealand's first export of Chinese gooseberries. Due to pioneering research into the transportability of the fruit by John Pilkington Hudson and others at the agriculture department in Wellington, this was the first international export of the kiwifruit.
Rebranding the Chinese gooseberry
As the local popularity of this fruit increased, New Zealanders discarded the local Chinese name for the fruit (yáng táo) in favour of the name Chinese gooseberry. Among the exporters was the prominent produce company Turners and Growers, who were calling the berries melonettes, because the local name for the fruit, Chinese gooseberry, had political connotations due to the Cold War, and to further distinguish it from European gooseberries, which are prone to a fungus called anthracnose. An American importer, Norman Sondag of San Francisco, complained that melonettes was as bad as Chinese gooseberry because melons and berries were both subject to high import tariffs, and instead asked for a short Māori name that quickly connoted New Zealand. In June 1959, during a meeting of Turners and Growers management in Auckland, Jack Turner suggested the name kiwifruit after its furry brown appearance similar to the country's endemic flightless bird kiwi; this was adopted and later became the industry-wide name. In the 1960s and 1970s, Frieda Caplan, founder of Los Alamitos-based Frieda's Inc., played a key role in popularising kiwifruit in the United States, convincing supermarket produce managers to carry the odd-looking fruit.
Industry maturation
The growth of the export market during this time was composed of individual growers, grower cooperatives, exporters and distributors. An attempt to develop a joint marketing effort saw the establishment of the Kiwifruit Export Promotion Committee in 1970, followed by the Kiwifruit Marketing Licensing Authority in 1977. The Kiwifruit Marketing Licensing Authority had the rights to establish market standards such as fruit size, quality and packaging of kiwifruit for export markets, the Authority also acted as an adviser to the government. This gave growers some control of licensing exporters.
Industry growth
The total volume of kiwifruit exports rapidly increased from the late 1960s to early 1970s. During this time, the number or exporting firms also dramatically increased. By 1976, the total volume of fruit New Zealand produced had exceeded the volume domestically consumed.
In 1974, kiwifruit was added to the consumer price index (CPI) basket.