What variety do I plant? – presentation

June 2017 | Jonathan Brookes and Steve Spark, AgFirst | Future Orchards® presentation

This presentation asks one of the most consequential questions in orchard redevelopment: what variety should be planted next? Rather than treating variety choice as a simple preference, AgFirst frames it as a business decision that must connect market demand, expected returns, production performance and the capability of the orchard site.

The resource encourages growers to compare varieties using a disciplined set of criteria. These include likely packout, market window, yield potential, fruit size and colour, labour demand, harvest timing, licensing or marketing arrangements, and whether a variety is well matched to the chosen rootstock and orchard system. The message is that a new block has a long productive life, so the decision needs to be made with both current economics and future market risk in mind.

For growers planning redevelopment, the slides are most useful as a decision framework. They support discussion with marketers, nurseries and advisers before trees are ordered, and reinforce the need to test assumptions around price, production and cost rather than relying on enthusiasm for a new cultivar alone.