Investment in avocado research has doubled – and sharing of knowledge and the involvement of all within the industry will be vital to achieving its optimum benefit, says Dr Alvaro Vidiella, innovation manager with NZ Avocado.

The industry has received Ministry for Business Innovation and Employment funding of $4.5 million during five years and that coupled with investment from Plant & Food and NZ Avocado will see $8 million going into research in the next seven years, with a higher proportion of the funding going to productivity research.

'NZ Avocado alone has 17 projects looking at seven areas of research and with all this activity we have to carry out, as an organisation, we cannot do it alone. But as an industry working together with a plan we can reach our goal,” says Alvaro.
The research programmes will look at mitigation of alternate bearing, reproductive biology, new cultivars, tree decline, irrigation, frost and chilling and nutrition.
Improving the performance and consistency of lower producing orchards, and lifting productivity across the entire industry, is also a major focus.
'Our industry average yield is not very good and it varies very much. In the top 200 hectares for the last four years the average yield is higher but still not very high. However, we do have some orchards with high yields and low variability.”
Those high producing orchards will form part of the research studies; and Alvaro says initial research shows pinning down exactly what is happening on orchard and what makes a difference to performance is not easy as an avocado orchard is a complex system where circumstances change constantly.
High producing orchards are found alongside those which don't perform as well; and while some may have a unique microclimate or soils, management practices may also make a difference. However, even on high producing orchards, some blocks may not perform as well. Alvaro says Te Puke orchardist Robert Jefferies has carefully recorded the performance of all his trees for the last three years and identified some production limiting factors, including a cold spring with southwest winds which reduced fruit set and the impacts of a frost.
'This year, following a good spring, he is looking at 14 tonnes per hectare.”
By recording and understanding what was happening in his orchard Robert was able to change management practices and thinks his success this year is not only due better environment conditions but also better practices.
Alvaro says there is no silver bullet to solve the industry's problems of irregular bearing but there is hope.
'We have to have an integrated approach and look at the different sources of variability in different orchards to see how they affect productivity and find which sources are the most limiting factors. If we understand when they become limiting we can develop best practice.”
Scientific research will be part of that development but so will on-orchard research; and crucial to it all
will be continued communication between and involvement of growers, consultants and all stakeholders, says Alvaro.