Kiwifruit: taking its place in the global fruit bowl

Abstract

While the world total production of kiwifruit has increased by over 50% during the last decade, the kiwifruit remains a niche fruit, taking up an estimated 0.22% of the global fruit bowl, which is dominated by apples, oranges, and bananas. Even though kiwifruit's share of the global fruit bowl has remained largely unchanged over the past 15 years, the scope for growth in the category is significant, with the nutritional and production characteristics of kiwifruit being on the right side of key global consumer trends around health and sustainability. Taking advantage of these consumer trends is one of two key challenges for the global kiwifruit industry. The second challenge is to harness the diverse natural and cultivated range of kiwifruit varieties (colors, flavors, sizes, and shapes) to stimulate the interest of consumers and grow the share of kiwifruit in the fruit basket through selecting cultivars that can develop meaningful market segments and meet consumer demand.