The Innovation

An insight into Zespri's ingenius plan to develop a new product

Failure meets unexpected success; where the failure becomes their best selling product!

ZESPRI^TM SUNGOLD^TM KIWIFRUIT

GOLDEN AND GLORIOUSLY SWEET.

Three times the vitamin C of an orange makes a SunGold kiwifruit a robust fortifier of your body's natural defenses, and it is deliciously sweet.

In the 90s, Zespri were thriving with their success and progress with their beststelling Zespri Green Kiwifruit and were searching for a new oppourtunity for growth and expansion within their company. This lead to 1999, where the world's first gold kiwifruit with the intentions to sell to consumers was developed.

Through Zespri's research and development programme combined with Plant and Food Research (PFR), Zespri had over 10 new variations of gold kiwifruit that they were testing and developing for consumer sale. These kiwifruit vaired in size, taste, and growing/harvest seasons.

In 2010, a virus hit New Zealand that changed Zespri's kiwifruit development forever:

Enter PSA

Pseudomonas syringae pv. actinidiae

PSA is one of the most serious diseases of kiwifruit.

In 2010, PSA contaminated kiwifruit orchards all around New Zealand. This rapid spread of the disease caused multiple varieties of kiwifruits to become victim to the disease and eventually become extinct due to the strength of the virus. In particular, the kiwifruits that Zespri were researching and breeding were eventually eliminated by the disease.

However, one kiwifruit was left standing.

The Gold3 variety, also known as the SunGold Kiwi that is found in our supermarkets today, turned out to be the one kiwifruit variety that was able to withstand the virus - it had near immunity against PSA. G3 especially stood out to Zespri's research and development team, as they noticed that it was even more immune to the disease than their staple Green Kiwifruit (Hort16A), which was exhibiting severe symptoms at the time such as a whole vine collapse. This lead to the removal of large volumes of infected canopy and vines which later affected productivity. Fortunetly, Plant and Food Research and Zespri's breeding programmes had produced new cultivars which as mentioned before were orginionally designed for reseach and developemt as well as early market research. Due to the discovery of G3's immunity, the cultivar G3 was released to growers in 2010 to rapidly replace the cultivars of Hort16A that were damaged by the PSA outbreak and to hopefully manage the spread of PSA.

The Innovation:

Zespri's intend innovation of Gold Kiwifruit was to use the support activity of research and development to create the tastiest, largest, and biggest growing window of all the gold kiwifruit varieties. Instead, the outbreak of PSA sped up PFR and Zespri's research and development. They were left with the gold kiwifruit variety that was immune to a disease that was infecting canopy and orchards where efficiency and productivity decreased immensely. Zespri was able to minimise this decrease by replacing the cultivars of Hort16A with G3 kiwifruit. It was discovered that SunGold Kiwi also had a larger lifespan than any of the other gold varietys, as well as Hort16A. The kiwifruit being able to be held onto for longer without rotting meant that Zespri was able to keep it in their storerooms and chillers for longer, and they were able to sell the kiwifruit for an extended period of time. The larger selling window meant that sales and revenue would increase drastically.

The sweeter tase of the SunGold Kiwi made it appealing to a new target market. Typically fruit is sweeter, and consumers generally migrate towards sweeter items. Since Green kiwi has a tart taste, SunGold Kiwi creates a sweeter and tropical taste that will introduce a new audience to kiwifruit. Zespri's sales and marketing team noticed this, and have promoted SunGold's sweetness and health benefits to attract new customers who are looking for a sweet fruit to try.

Kiwifruit is one of New Zealand's most valuable and largest export industries. We produce over 100 million trays of kiwifruit from orchards of a combined 11,000 hectares altogether. Despite the high incidince of PSA, the kiwifruit industry was and still continues to grow at an unprecedented rate. Since 2015, the revenue earned from exported New Zealand kiwifruit exeeded the revenue generated prior to PSA, and even surpassed 2014 annual predicitons. This growth in productiviy to support industry grown had relied heavily on Zespri's response of combating and actively managing PSA.

How do I identify PSA?

Keep an eye out for:

leaf blotches with straight edges
leaf and plant wiltingtwig and cane dieback and cracking
cankers (lesions) on canes, leaders, and trunks
red or white ooze to form on the undersides of leaves, canes, buds, joints of branches, forks, leaf scars, and pruning scars
infected flowers to turn brown and wither without opening
affected fruit to be small and misshapen
fruit to collapse because the branch has wilted and the fruit is not getting the fluid it needs.

Why should I be concerned about PSA?

PSA is one of the most detrimental and harmful diseases to kiwifruit. It causes bacterial canker of green and gold kiwifruit. We currently have one variety of PSA present in New Zealand, however there are other strains we are attempting to keep out.

If new strains of PSA are found or come into New Zealand from other parts of the world, they could cause further losses. Much like what happened to Zespri, many different varieties of kiwifruit may become extinct if new strains of PSA are introduced into New Zealand.

Page updated