Durian from China? Hainan gears up for initially harvest of Southeast Asia’s ‘king of fruits’

Chinese are keen customers of the spiky fruit with its uniquely potent smell from nations such as Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam. But costs are ordinarily higher due to transport charges.

Analysts say Chinese-grown durian could decrease domestic costs, deepen “dual circulation” and enhance international agricultural cooperation. But the crucial to its good results is irrespective of whether customers will come across it palatable.

“The crucial to mass-advertising domestic durian is about its capability to replicate the taste of these created in their nations of origin,” according to Weng Ming, a researcher at the Institute of Rural Improvement beneath the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Most tropical fruit in China is nevertheless imported and its taste hard to replicate, according to Weng.

“Figs, for instance, are primarily created in the Middle East and North Africa, and the taste of figs from Shandong, China, is nowhere close to the taste of imports,” he stated.

As a outcome, Weng stated China’s foray into durian expanding “definitely will not impact the durian business in Southeast Asia”.

But China’s sophisticated durian cultivation technologies could open possibilities for international cooperation by means of agricultural technologies exchange, he stated.

“We require to see this breakthrough from a sense of cooperation rather than competitors,” Weng stated.

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Durian is the No 1 imported fruit into China, reaching US$four.03 billion final year with a total import volume of 825,000 tonnes, according to information supplied from the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Foodstuffs, Native Create and Animal By-Merchandise (CFNA).

Durian is most common amongst young folks, with more than 60 per cent of the fruit in China getting purchased by customers aged 16-35, according to information released by Jingdong Supermarket in November.

Its customers are primarily concentrated in China’s initially-tier cities, and netizens have coined the term “durian liberty” to describe its not-so-cost-effective value tag.

Escalating transport charges, coupled with the brief storage period and rising industry demand in China, have resulted in the higher value of durian, according to a report on the Chinese durian industry published by huaon.com in November.

By 2026, China’s durian industry will be worth close to 130 billion yuan in retail sales, the report stated.

Conscious of the enormous demand, Hainan sought to capitalise on its climate for durian cultivation in the 1950s, nevertheless, immature expanding strategies have held it back.

Thailand represented 96 per cent of China’s durian imports by worth and 95 per cent of the total import volume in the previous year, according to the (CFNA).

With the ratification of the Regional Complete Financial Partnership in January 2022, preferential tariffs and more quickly customs clearance have attracted much more Southeast Asian nations to export fruit to China.