T&G’s Joli is its latest apple line, launched in 2023, and follows Envy and Jazz varieties.
The company which began as Turners and Growers, a fruit auction business in Auckland 125 years ago, has identified the region as a good base for growing the new variety.
Initially, 125 hectares on a Mid Canterbury dairy farm will be planted in spring with the rest carried out the following year.
This will be the region’s first commercial planting of the new variety following trials.
So far 55ha of Joli trees are in the ground in Hawke’s Bay, with plans to have 250ha in orchards under licence throughout main growing regions by the end of next year.
T&G has entered into an agreement for the orchard venture with the New Zealand Superannuation Fund, through its rural investment manager FarmRight.
T&G Apples chief operating officer Shane Kingston said one of the company’s business goals was to have diversified growing and local conditions suited the introduction of an apple orchard in Canterbury.
‘‘We had already planted in Hawke’s Bay with 55ha and when we were looking for conditions for Joli to be successful Canterbury came up really strongly when we think about climatic conditions, availability of water, soil types and land available for such a venture. So it made really good sense to diversify to Canterbury.’’
He said development would start with the orchard infrastructure and carry through to the start of tree planting in spring.
Apples could be harvested after four or five years, but trees would take seven years before they started fruiting at a commercially viable crop level, he said.
‘‘It just shows the level of commitment from the NZ Super Fund, FarmRight and T&G for the region and the variety. In the context it’s a long-term play.’’
The farm site and total cost of the venture has not been publicly released, but was likely to be a multimillion-dollar investment converting dairy land into an orchard.
Mr Kingston said the partners had evaluated the projected returns from their investment in the Joli orchard.
‘‘As you could imagine with the decision been made here, the Super Fund and FarmRight are in a number of primary industry sectors, dairy included, so they have got a very good understanding lens on returns per hectare and for them this is a good investment.’’
Mr Kingston said the NZ Super Fund was investing in horticulture as a way to create wealth for New Zealanders as well as producing high quality food for global consumers with the support of FarmRight and T&G.
He said Joli was a large red apple with juicy, crispy and sweetness qualities.
‘‘We still have some questions to answer, but all of the consumer research work we have done and all of the market assessment we have done and all of our understanding of fresh produce and apples give us really strong signals that this has the potential .... to be a real success for the Asian consumer.’’
He said the flavour profile was sought after by consumers across Asia and customers were waiting for the first delivery in 2027.
More Joli plantings were unlikely in Canterbury over the next two years, but potentially in the longer term.
FarmRight’s general manager of the NZ Super Fund Portfolio Ed Tapp said the initiative continued the NZ Super Fund strategy of investing in commercial varieties delivering high returns.
‘‘We are excited to be bringing large scale apple production to Mid-Canterbury and the Joli plantings will bring the total canopy area on the dairy-to-apples conversion to 250ha.”
Over the next four to five years, as more trees become available, T&G plans to extend the growing of Joli to growers in Europe and the United States.
T&G is the sole licene-holder for growing, marketing and selling Joli apples. The commercial plantings follow nearly a decade of the company working with partners to develop and trial the variety.
Jazz and Envy exceeded projected returns last year for growers. That was a result of a slightly smaller crop because of ‘‘residual cyclone impacts’’ in Hawke’s Bay and T&G also credited strong in-market sales and cost management.
Last year returns for Envy increased by $3.65 per carton compared with 2023, while Jazz rose $5.60 per carton.
This season’s expected carton returns would likely be released to growers at the end of next month when a crop evaluation was completed.
