Over one million tonnes of fruit exports in first half

The export figures were reported to the meeting of the so-called “Fruit Board”, or the committee in charge of development and management of fruits, which is ex-officio chaired by Agriculture Minister Chalermchai Sri-on.

The meeting was held on Monday and Chalermchai assigned his adviser, Alongkorn Ponlaboot, to chair the third meeting of the Fruit Board for this year.

Alongkorn said the meeting was informed that exports during the first half of this year was 120,000 tonnes higher than in the same period last year.

The meeting was pleased with the export performance of fruits but the committee was warned to plan ahead to manage longans in eastern provinces, which would be harvested late this year, Alongkorn said.

He said the meeting also approved a project to provide remedy to longan farmers, whose harvest could not be sold mainly because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Alongkorn said the meeting also resolved to set up two forward commands for managing fruits – one in the South and the other in the North.

He said Somchuan Ratanamangalanon, deputy permanent secretary at the Agriculture Ministry, was appointed as chief of the Southern forward command and Chatree Bunnag, Agriculture Ministry’s inspector-general, as chief of the Northern forward command.

Alongkorn said the two forward commands would work with 22 provincial fruit management committees, which are headed by their respective provincial governors, to solve problems related to fruits that would be harvested during the second half of this year.

He said the Northern forward command would have to particularly deal with longans that would come into the market in the second half.

Alongkorn said Chalermchai has instructed the Fruit Board to speed up the implementation of the five-year development plan for fruits for 2022-27. The plan aims to improve the quality of Thai fruits.

Alongkorn said the Fruit Board would focus on development of production technologies, the processing of fruits, the creation of Thai fruit brands, the use of traceability system of fruits, and efforts to expand both local and foreign markets as part of the implementation of the development plan.

He said the Fruit Board would also study measures to cope with the expansion of durian orchards both in Thailand and other countries that would compete for market share in export to China.

According to Alongkorn, the Fruit Board also made several decisions, including:

• Setting up a committee to be in charge of developing mangosteens and coconuts

• Assigning a subcommittee to implement a plan to comprehensively solve issues related to longan production as proposed in a study, whose results were reported to the Fruit Board on Monday

• Approving a plan to manage 764,777 tonnes of longan expected to be harvested in the northern provinces this year

• Approving a plan to manage 487,459 tonnnes of durians, mangosteens, rambutans, and southern langsats that will be harvested this year.

• Assigning the secretariat of the Fruit Board to draft proposals on how to provide remedy to longan farmers for their harvests in 2021 and 2022. The proposals will be sent to the agriculture minister for sending to the Cabinet for deliberation.