Browse Data and Analysis

New Zealand’s apple planted area in the 2023/2024 market year (MY) is forecast to be 9,200 hectares (ha), a substantial drop from 11,000 ha at the start of the 2022/2023 MY. This is due to the impacts of Cyclone Gabrielle, which brought large-scale floodwaters, silt, debris, wind, and surface flooding to the primary apple growing regions of Hawkes Bay and Gisborne.

Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) has approved a Queensland University of Technology (QUT) application to permit food derived from a banana line genetically engineered (GE) for resistance to Panama disease.

Vietnam offers abundant opportunities for exporting consumer-oriented products, despite the challenges of recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and dealing with high inflation. The Vietnamese economy is poised for significant expansion in the coming decades. With a burgeoning population and a growing middle class, Vietnamese consumers are becoming more discerning about the origin and composition of their food.

Farmland in Hong Kong is limited. In 2022, local agricultural production (livestock and crops) yielded about $173 million worth of fresh food. Hence, Hong Kong relies on imports of fresh produce to feed its 7.3 million residents.

Australia is a crucial market for U.S. fresh fruits because of the year-round demand for high-quality products. The U.S. has benefitted from a well-established reputation for producing quality and safe fruits.

On December 25, 2023, Taiwan announced that U.S. cherries exported to Taiwan will undergo enhanced border inspection (20 – 50 percent inspection rate) from April 1 until September 30, 2024.

Despite challenges related to the slow economy, citrus production in China for marketing year (MY) 2023/24 is expected to continue to grow, outperforming other fruit categories.

Already reeling from high fruit prices, Korean consumers will face another year of expensive, lower-quality apples. Korea’s apple production for marketing year (MY) 2023/24 fell 25 percent year-on-year after orchards suffered a series of adverse weather events in 2023.

Japan’s MY 2022/23 mandarin production recovers from last year’s historically lowest production. However, overall Japanese citrus planted area and production is on a downward trend amidst aging farmers, labor shortages, and a lack of successors for running farms.

Early seasonal conditions for the MY 2023/24 citrus crop have been favorable, and producers expect to benefit from an easing of fertilizer and crop protection chemical costs, along with a further easing of labor constraints. Orange production is expected to increase five percent to 530,000 metric tons (MT) from the prior’s year estimate, the second highest over the last two decades.

Ample opportunities exist for U.S. agricultural exports to South Korea. Highlighted in the chart above, U.S. agricultural product exports were a record $9.5 billion in 2022, up 2 percent from 2021. South Korea is the sixth largest export market for the United States, thanks in part to a successful free trade agreement (KORUS) between the two countries and a robust demand for high-quality U.S. food products.

World peach and nectarine1 production has seen significant growth in the past decade, rising more than 20 percent from 19.6 million tons to 24.2 million in 2022/23.