Industry Report 2006-2007 - Apple & Pear Australia Limited (Page 10 of 15) in pdf

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apple and pear australia volume 4 2007

Orchard Production Projects

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intensive peAr proDuction in AustrAliA

pAcking sheD BenchMArking

AnGIe GrILLs - department of primary Industries, VIC

Graeme Forsythe & Associates

The 2006/07 season provided many challenges to pear growers with

These learnings are being communicated through articles as well as a

After labour, packing is one of the largest costs faced by fruit producers.

drought and frost impacts felt in many regions. Whilst this has been

recently developed

Packing costs are of the order of 25-35% of total production costs.

a difficult period, it is essential that the industry remains focused on

website on intensive pear production which can be accessed through

improving production efficiency to ensure long term sustainability.

the Victorian DPI site ( ). This site will serve as an

Packing costs are notoriously hard to measure as they contain, many,

Intensive production is still an avenue through which the industry can

important central location from which growers can access articles

sometimes hidden, components. These costs include fixed costs related

maintain its competitiveness and importantly ensure that with the advent

produced by the project as well as other relevant reports and links (as

to owned assets and leases, variable costs (labour and consumables

of a new variety can achieve early production and market advantage.

they arise).

such as packaging) and a basket of other costs such as services,

insurances and other overheads, partial use of cool rooms and transport,

The Adoption of Intensive Pear Production project was established to

The project has also supported activities such as drought/frost

palletisation costs, despatch costs etc.

develop Australian skills and expertise in intensive pear production. The

management, pruning/training at the APFIP pear rootstock trial site as

project is guided by a steering committee that meets yearly. The key

well as the visit of Jef De Coster to the Goulburn Valley.

One way of measuring the efficiency of a packhouse is to benchmark its

activities in the project to date have centred on gathering information

performance against that of other packhouses.

about intensive pear production both locally and around the world and

The next phase of the project will focus on developing management tools

providing a communication link to growers.

to assist growers with making decisions about planting pears intensively,

This project has devised simple, web-based software that allows the

as well as collaborating with other pear-related projects and technical

owners and managers of packhouses to benchmark the performance of

The ongoing focus of the project is to develop and maintain links with

field days.

their shed against that of others.

pear production experts worldwide and keep the Australian industry up

to date with international pear production trends. Key activities aligned

Simple, readily available data related to each shift the packhouse works

Funded by: Department of Primary Industries VIC, Commonwealth funds through HAL,

to this have been participation in the 2006 APAL study tour of Europe and

is collected and entered into the system via a web site. Data gathered

APAL levy funds

attendance at the 10th International Society for Horticultural Science

includes the number of labour hours utilised that shift (number of people

(ISHS) Pear Symposium in Portugal (where a paper was co-authored

photo 1: Growers thought flower numbers were low in Belgium in 2006,

working x length of shift) and their cost, the weight of fruit tipped on to

with John Palmer from HortResearch in New Zealand). Some of the key

so they sprayed with gibberellins which set too many fruit and resulted

the grader and the packed outputs (cartons of various sizes and grades,

learnings from these trips were:

in a need for more extensive hand thinning.

hat bins of Class 2 fruit, bins of juice fruit etc).

•

Generally 2000-4000 trees/ha is seen as the optimal density range

photo 2: the ‘doorgroeibomen’ (or sprint tree) system in Belgium

All sheds participating in the program enter their data for a particular

for intensive pear plantings.

achieved close to 30 t/ha in its second leaf. nursery trees are two years

period by a set cut off time. The program then calculates the efficiency of

old when planted, but not cut back in the final year in the nursery, as

each shed participating in the program. Outputs such as bins tipped per

•

Pear production is increasing in Asia, Argentina and South Africa.

with ‘normal’ feathered nursery trees.

labour hour, bins tipped per person, labour cost per bin tipped, labour

•

There is some stagnation in European production, however there are

cost per kg tipped, labour cost per kg packed, standard cartons per

still many young orchards yet to bear (particularly in Belgium and

packer, time(minutes) to pack a standard carton are then calculated.

the Netherlands where conference plantings have expanded rapidly

in the past two years).

Finally these are tabulated so that the shed which entered its data can

compare its results with those of other packhouses in the program.

•

Most pear production regions, like Australia, are seeking new

varieties to ‘excite’ the industry. Many regions in Europe are

The system can be used with most, if not all, types of produce. The

consistently achieving high early production in the third year and

system will be made available to Apple and Pear Australia Limited

therefore at this stage will

for placement on their website and accordingly access for all industry

have the advantage when

members.

new varieties are released.

•

The first club varieties of

pears have been seen in

Europe.

•

Research looking at

improving fruitset of pears

with gibberellins and

Regalis® (particularly

after stress events) and

rootpruning and stem

incisions has shown

interesting results in

Europe, which may be

applicable to Australian

conditions.

the system comes with easy set up and usage instructions

photo 2

photo 1

apple and pear australia volume 4 2007 page

Industry Report 2006-2007 - Apple & Pear Australia Limited Page 10

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