China: New Technology Brings Apple Harvest
Posted by Unknown in Apple, China, Fruits, Harvesting, Research and Technology on Friday, 25 January 2013
(China Daily )
After a period of storage, Dandong's Hanfu apples have become a
sought-after fruit on the market. It is sometimes even sold at a price
10 times higher than that of common apples. Fuyun Hanfu Apple Production
Cooperative is located in the Helong Manchu ethnic township in
Donggang. There, Yu Bo, chairman of the cooperative directs workers to
load and transport Hanfu apples. Each apple weighs over 0.5 kg and a
carton of them reach 5 kg. "They are golden apples. The wholesale price
has raised to more than 200 yuan ($ 31.58) a carton here. In Shanghai's
supermarkets, the price can reach as high as over 300 yuan a carton,"
says Yu Bo.
The
cooperative has 151 members. Since the end of October, it has delivered
50,000 cartons of fine Hanfu apples to Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and
other big cities. Yu Bo said that the reason for the popularity of Hanfu
apples among high-end consumers of large cities is their high quality
which can be attributed to increasingly advanced technologies. Farmer
Zhang Hongfeng from Kanxia village, Shizijie township, harvested 100,000
kg of Hanfu apples this year. They were sold for 8 yuan per kilo on
average. The price of fine apples among them reached 12 yuan per kilo.
"Two years ago my apples would only be sold at half of today's price or
less." Zhang Hongfeng told us.
In
the early days when he contracted the orchard, the quality of the
apples stagnated at a low level because of outdated varieties and
backward management. Later, new technologies such as fruit bagging and
reflective membranes were adopted, and both the output and quality of
the apples improved. In his orchard, pipelines for water-saving
irrigation have just been implemented. "With them, we will no longer
worry about dry seasons," said Zhang Hongfeng. He credited the
continuous increase of output to the new technologies promoted by
Donggang's fruit tree station. With the application of new technologies,
the quality of Donggang's Hanfu apples has continuously improved and
they have even won the first place at Liaoning (Shenyang) International
Agriculture Exposition for two consecutive sessions, in 2009 and 2011.
