Forelle Early Market Access

Post-harvest innovation has helped South Africa become a global leader in Forelle pear production and exports. Updated from an article originally published in Fresh Quarterly issue 3.

Forelle has been around for 350 years, says Dr Ian Crouch, managing director at ExperiCo Agri-Research Solutions. “Historically it’s been eaten as a sweet and juicy pear. But our problem was that Forelle becomes mealy if it’s sold before it’s had 12 weeks of cold storage.”

Forelle is a bicoloured pear. A typical bicoloured-pear season starts with the export of varieties that don’t have a chilling requirement for ripening, such as Rosemarie and Flamingo. In the past, there was then a hiatus until Forelle came out of cold storage. This gave other countries a chance to muscle in on the bicoloured-pear market.

“The moment you have a break in continuity the supermarkets go to other exporters like Chile,” explains Crouch. “Once they have a supply and they’re happy with the quality, they may not come back to South Africa.”

The 12-week cold storage period also put producers under pressure to pick as early as possible to export sooner. This led to the harvesting of suboptimally mature fruit. “We had a huge number of complaints from supermarkets about astringency,” recalls Crouch. Astringency is the dry, puckering sensation in the mouth caused by tannins in immature fruit.

The problems didn’t end there. Once South African Forelle finally made it to export markets, there was an oversupply. “We reached a point where the more we were producing, the lower the price became because we were forced to market in a very short window,” says Steven Versfeld, pome-fruit grower, and chair of the Forelle Producers’ Association.

No wonder researchers tried everything to bring the Forelle season forward and close the gap. “Harvest maturity, ethylene, cold shocks, hot shocks – we just couldn’t get it right,” recalls Crouch.

A pear that eats like an apple

The solution came in thinking outside the box. By leaving Forelle pears on the tree for longer, allowing them to develop higher sugar levels, and then treating them with the ethylene inhibitor 1-MCP – 1-methylcyclopropene – to stop ripening, the fruit could be exported immediately with no risk of mealiness.

Thus the Forelle Early Market Access programme – FEMA – was born. “The biggest challenge was to sell this concept to the market,” says Crouch. “To sell a pear that eats like an apple – initially we wondered whether we could do this.”

Crouch shares how they tested the waters with semi-commercial trials. Limited amounts of fruit were shipped to the United Kingdom, Germany, and the Middle and Far East in 2011 and 2012. “We tasted the fruit together with the marketers to get their feedback,” he remembers. “They were all very excited about it.”

Extensive research showed that certain markets preferred FEMA fruit over traditional Forelle. “In hot areas, they were 100% for this programme because it’s 40 ºC out there,” adds Crouch. “With FEMA you don’t get pears that overripen between the distribution centre and the supermarket – it’s opened up new markets for us in the Middle and the Far East, and more recently, in India.”

Versfeld agrees. “FEMA opened up the Middle East for us. We went from selling all our Forelle in the United Kingdom and Europe to selling the bulk in the Middle East. If you look at the percentage now sold in the Middle East, it’s enormous, and it’s all thanks to FEMA.”

Managing consumer expectations at all stages of the Forelle season was critical. “On each of the FEMA pears, we had a little sticker that said, ‘Crisp and sweet’. But the rest of the Forelle come in after 12 weeks and these are soft and juicy,” explains Crouch. “You have a crossover period when the fruit this week is totally different from last week. You have to make sure people know what they’re getting.”

“It took off like a rocket”

The success of FEMA surprised even Crouch. “It took off like a rocket,” he comments. Export volumes grew from 330 000 cartons of FEMA fruit in 2012 to an estimated 1.9 million in 2022.

Richard Hurndall, previously the post-harvest-programme manager at Hortgro Science, calculated that FEMA generated approximately R186 million of additional income for growers during 2012-2018. This figure only includes the premium received for a carton of FEMA fruit compared with a conventional Forelle carton.

Based on the same figures, Hurndall also calculated that, up to 2014, the FEMA programme had returned about R10 for every R1 invested in the research.

FEMA has been instrumental in growing the market for Forelle exports. “It’s opened new markets and improved the price. It’s had a huge impact – Forelle is now our second-largest cultivar and people are still planting Forelle,” says Crouch.

Versfeld reckons Forelle may even now be the biggest cultivar by income. “I can imagine after this year it’s not going to be too tough for Forelle to be the biggest, judging by the prices I got for Packham’s.”

But the FEMA programme does present its own challenges. For orchards to be released, the fruit must meet certain standards, including sugar levels of at least 14 ºBrix and firmness of 5.5-6.0 kilograms. Some orchards struggle to meet the firmness requirement because the fruit remains too hard.

“If you hang the fruit too long, and it becomes too yellow, you end up with problems trying to sell that fruit,” says Crouch. “If these fruit don’t qualify for FEMA, you still have to treat it with 1-MCP, and then store it for the mandatory 12 weeks to prevent mealiness or overripe fruit in the market.”

Although there will always be scope for refinement and improvement, there is no doubt that FEMA is one of the success stories of the South African fruit industry, says Crouch.

“When we saw that it worked, we decided to go big,” says Versfeld, thinking back to the first years of FEMA. What is his assessment ten years later? “It worked fantastically!”

Bonus: The latest FEMA research

Daniël Viljoen, research manager at ExperiCo Agri-Research Solutions, recently concluded three Hortgro-funded projects to help growers and marketers better manage Forelle. He relooked at fruit-quality criteria for the FEMA programme and considered the options for fruit that do not meet these criteria.

The eating quality of FEMA pears depends on firmness, sweetness, acidity, and the absence of astringency. The current criteria for FEMA fruit are 6.0 kg maximum firmness and 14 ºBrix total soluble solids. Total soluble solids indicate sugar content.

Acidity, measured as malic acid equivalents, decreases with ripening and storage. High levels can occur in FEMA fruit because 1-methylcycloprene – 1-MCP – treatment retards ripening, and shorter storage means less time for acids to break down.

Viljoen found that consumers dislike high acid levels, so he recommends that FEMA fruit should contain less than 0.25% malic acid equivalents.

Provided malic acid is below 0.25%, he also found that it was possible to compromise slightly on either firmness or sugar levels without affecting the eating experience. Taste assessments showed that eating quality was maintained up to 6.3 kg firmness when total soluble solids were above 14 ºBrix.

When flesh firmness was below 6.0 kg, eating quality was maintained as long as sugars were above 13 ºBrix.

The next step is for Viljoen to present his findings to the Forelle Producers’ Association, which will decide whether or not to amend the criteria for the FEMA programme.

Even if they adopt new standards, some orchards will still fail to achieve these. As FEMA fruit are harvested later than conventional Forelle, failure to meet FEMA standards leaves a grower with potentially overmature pears. What is the best strategy for these fruit?

Based on his research, Viljoen recommends treating them with 1-MCP at the same rates as would normally be used for FEMA fruit before subjecting them to the same 8-week cold storage period before shipping that is applied to conventional Forelle.

Forelle harvested later and treated in this way will not soften, so should be marketed as crisp to manage consumer expectations.

Image: South African Forelle.

Supplied by Anna Mouton. Fruit supplied by Adriaan Theron | Ceres Fruit Growers.