Zespri shares innovation in inaugural Symposium

MEDIA RELEASE – 21 September 2015

Zespri shares innovation in inaugural Symposium

Zespri invests over $15 million in kiwifruit innovation science each year and the inaugural Kiwifruit Innovation Symposium on 29 October in Mt Maunganui gives people a chance to see the latest developments for themselves.

Zespri General Manager Marketing and Innovation Carol Ward explains innovation is huge part of the industry with significant investment from Zespri, along with the NZ government and industry. Zespri wants to share this work with its community and hear their ideas about where innovation could go in the future.

“We want to show our growers and industry what’s coming up and the future challenges we’re tackling. The focus for the past few years has been on developing tools and techniques to grow profitably with Psa – now we’re turning our focus back to other areas again and we want to bring industry along with us.

“And it’s not all one way – we want to know what direction our industry thinks we should be heading in,” says Ms Ward.

Zespri’s investment in innovation over the past 15 years has underpinned its premium brand in the marketplace and helped the industry earn $1.57 billion in sales last year.

“Innovation has given our growers the world’s leading kiwifruit varieties and the tools to grow the best kiwifruit in the world, as well as a world-class supply chain. We want to show the industry how we’re building on this for the future and supporting the strong growth ahead,” says Ms Ward.

The Symposium will be held at the ASB Arena, Mt Maunganui on Thursday 29 October. This will be followed by the Hayward Medal Dinner in the same venue, where the industry celebrates its finest people with the presentation of the 2015 Fresh Carrier Hayward Medal.

The early bird ticket package for the symposium and dinner is $150 and is available until 30 September. Tickets to the conference are $50 each.

For more information and a copy of the full programme, check out www.zesprievents.co.nz

Workshop topics include:

• Optimising knowledge transfer within the Zespri supply chain – led by Dr Matt Adkins

• Taste: where to next? – led by Dr Greg Clark

• Health: do consumers really care? – led by Dr Juliet Ansell

• Biosecurity: the great unknown – led by Dr Elaine Gould

• Beyond Hayward- the future of the green category – led by Bryan Parkes

• Productivity: how much is too much? – led by Dr David Armour

Ends

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