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THE FRUITGROWER IS PUBLISHED BY
At the recent Oxford FarmingConferenceDEFRA’s Andrea LeadsomMPpromised
that the government would ensure that the food and farming sectors have the
labour they need, but the detailswere not settled yet. Lobbying seems tobe
working on this issue, but perhaps the threat of seeing fields full of rotting fruit and
vegetables, if we don’t get access to the 85,000 seasonal workerswe currently
need, has concentrated theminds of politicians. Promises to keep the present
CAP-funding until 2020 have not been extendedwith guarantees further into our
post-Brexit future, sowe start 2017with some reassurances butmuch uncertainty.
Soft fruit growers can give themselves a pat on the back as the recently published
AHDBHorticultureStrategy 2017-2020 shows that, although the demand formost
crops is fairly static, themarket for berry fruits is exceptional in havingdoubled or
more in volume over the last decade. Themain change to the horticulture budget
between 2016-17 and 2019-20 is a progressive increase in knowledge exchange
and a corresponding reduction inR&D expenditure. A slow take-up of new
research seems tobe a problem in parts of horticulture, but we can congratulate
our agronomists and scientists for their part in the success of the industry. The
tenacious survival of research at EastMalling (NIABEMR), local fruit growers’
societies events, institutions like theNational Fruit Show and the uniqueUnder 40s
Fruit GrowersConference, have all guaranteedmore opportunities for knowledge
exchange. It is vital for growers and their employees to continue to find the time to
leave the farm to look beyond their day-to-day struggles.
There is good news for the smart control of moth pests; already commercially
available in Europe after three years of UK trials, BASF, workingwithAgrovista, has
launched the firstmulti-pest pheromone disruption system, namedRAK 3+4.
Designed to give season-long control of codling and tortrixmoth species, the
pheromone cloud is released fromApril toOctober. Orchards are floodedwith high
rates of synthetic pheromones, andmalemoths become confused andmating is
disrupted.
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CO N T E N T S
News
Page 4
Cropcovers
Page 5
Newapple
varieties
Page 8
Soft Fruit Day
Page 9
Research Briefing Page12
Fruit and vineyard
tractors
Page 14
New IPM tool
Page 18
Harvesting
platform
Page 21
Fruit tree
harvest
Page 23
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