Jason Te Brake: Zespri CEO on the success of the kiwifruit industry

Zespri is optimistic for 2025 after what it says has been an encouraging year for growers. 

Its last charter vessel for the season has left for Japan, expecting to arrive early next month with just over 4,500 tonnes of fruit. 

The company says Europe has been performing really well, while China has seen a 40% increase in volume. 

CEO Jason Te Brake told Mike Hosking they're expecting to have more fruit to sell in 2025. 

He says markets are finishing really strongly, which usually flows into a good start of next year. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
More good news for our economy. Been a record season
as it turns out for Kiwi fruit. Not quite over,
but it's coming to an end. One hundred and ninety
million trays six hundred and eighty four thousand tons have
been exported to fifty different markets. Final shipments of the
Green and the Sun Gold they're off in the coming weeks. Now.
The CEO, Jason Debraca, is with this. Jason, very good.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Morning to you, Monnie White. How are you very well?

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Indeed you're new to this particular job.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
You're loving it, Yeah, I am. Actually it's going well
and the season's tracking pretty well as well. So about
three months into the role, but being more sccessful about four.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
Years fantastic sixty two charter vessels tell me the shipping story,
how successful, how unincumbered are we shipping wise these days?

Speaker 2 (00:39):
So we've got a pretty strong charter program. So we
do about half of our fruit on charter vessels, and
it actually helps us get fruit to the market quickly,
helps us reliability to supply and actually our customers give
us really strong feedback. It's one of our main points
of difference.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Good so we don't have supply chain issues as they
say they've.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Resolved themselves quite a lot a couple of years ago.
Still some challenges around some of the reports here, but
that's most to do with the line of vessels coming.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
In China up forty percent? Are they back?

Speaker 2 (01:11):
China's economy is still a little bit sluggish. What we've
found is we've been able to outperform the category and
outperform the economy quite well. Just good strong brand and
good quality fruit into the market and good demands for
Kiwi fruit.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Okay, the big important question now is the Ziji. Yes,
the vote. You're going to have a vote, and you've
had a vote before for people who don't follow this.
You had a vote before in the grays Wooden back.
You will they this time?

Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah? I believe we will. We're only putting it full
because we've got really strong confidence that the support we've
had over the last three to four months has been
really good, so we believe that we can get across
the line on this. We've had really good engagement with
the industry for a good three or four months now,
and I've been part of actually designing the proposal, so
we feel confident that there's good support there there.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
Press forward if you're right. What's changed between this vote
and the last one.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
There's actually quite a few things. You know. We've been
able to focus really strongly back on our New Zealand
business and getting good returns through our New Zealand Girls
the last two seasons, so girls are comfortable for that.
But we've also changed the proposal and how we've gone
through that so that girls have been actually at the
center of the discussions, been involved in designing the proposal
and had really good feedback was this where along the way,

(02:26):
So it's a bit more of a collaborative process we've
been through this time.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Good to explain to the people who don't follow, there's
four hundred and twenty additional hectares of sun gold across Italy, France, Japan,
South Korea and Greece. Does that solve our problem in
the year round thing and all the cheats out there
trying to rip us off?

Speaker 2 (02:44):
It helps what we've got At the moment, we're up
against the full limit that we can plant based on
what we've currently got approved, so for us to continue
to compete in our off season, we need to be
able to continue to plant more outlet that production. So
it does help us in that.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
You've got a vibe for twenty five. All we don't know.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
Look looking pretty positive to twenty five, so we think
the crop might be up slightly so a bit more
fruit to sell. But the market's actually finishing really strongly
at the moment, in strong six or seven weeks. So
usually when you see a good end of the season,
they can flow until a good beginning as well, so
I'm quite optimistic at the stage.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
Fantastic good on You're nice to talk to. You appreciate
it very much. Jason de Branca, who's the new ish
head of or CEO of zespriing good news for the economy.

Speaker 2 (03:30):
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Speaker 1 (03:33):
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