Summerfruit NZ and the Apricot Co Interim Board (ACIB) have made good progress this year to establish an industry led cooperative, now registered as NZ Summer Fresh Ltd (previously referred to as Apricot Co). NZ Summer Fresh will transition to a cooperative over the next few months and will also be responsible for the operational activities previously under the ACIB including distribution of plant material.
Roger Brownlie is currently the sole director until grower shareholders are in place, representing Summerfruit NZ who are the NZ Summer Fresh founding shareholder. Roger is being assisted by Kaylene Dowers who will carry out the administration during the transition including shareholder applications, board election process and organisation of the inaugural AGM. Kaylene can be contacted via email.
Summerfruit NZ (on behalf of NZ Summer Fresh) are continuing to negotiate a Master License for the Nzsummer varieties with Plant & Food Research. Unfortunately, this process has been slower than we had planned and is still several weeks away from being signed.
Plant & Food Research made it clear last season that they would not continue to offer growers trial agreements on these varieties (Nzsummer2, Nzsummer3, Nzsummer4). That means that they will not supply plant material to nurseries for propagation. As the Master License is not yet in place, NZ Summer Fresh are unable to issue growers and nurseries commercial agreements for the coming budding season to cover the propagation and ordering of these varieties.
NZ Summer Fresh has had no choice but to temporarily freeze new tree orders of the Nzsummer series apricots for the 2022 propagation/2023 planting season. As soon as a Master License is in place, NZ Summer Fresh will be championing the uptake of trees and will recommence orders for future planting.
For Nzsummer trees currently growing in nurseries, these can only be released to growers under a NZ Summer Fresh sub license. NZ Summer Fresh is working hard to ensure the Master License is in place as soon as possible so sub licenses are issued prior to tree lifting in 2022.
NZ Summer Fresh apologises for any inconvenience this may cause and will keep you informed of progress as soon as more information is available.
If you have any questions on the progress of NZ Summer Fresh or the Nzsummer trees, please contact either Roger Brownlie, Director of NZ Summer Fresh on 027 452 7999 or via email, or contact Kate Hellstrom.