{"id":430,"date":"2014-12-13T02:40:22","date_gmt":"2014-12-13T02:40:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ozone-services.com\/?p=430"},"modified":"2014-12-13T02:40:22","modified_gmt":"2014-12-13T02:40:22","slug":"ozone-use-fruit-growers-new-zealand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/ozone-use-fruit-growers-new-zealand\/","title":{"rendered":"Ozone use for fruit growers in New Zealand"},"content":{"rendered":"

NZ fruit growers embrace ozone tech for healthy orchards<\/h2>\n
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Read full article HERE<\/a>
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After a successful trial on a kiwifruit orchard in New Zealand, an ozone technology that encourages plant health has been embraced by producers including Turners & Growers (NZX: TUR). While OA-Global director Brendon Spencer emphasizes his company\u2019s ozone-based overhead spraying system\u00a0is not a cure for vine disease Psa, it has great potential for<\/em>\u00a0fighting bacteria across different fruit crops.\u00a0<\/em>The executive now hopes Chilean growers will embrace the innovation, and is also curious to see how it will go in counteracting botrytis in grapes.<\/em><\/p>\n

Spencer is right when he says the results of the technology have been \u201cstaggering\u201d, citing a trial that began 18 months ago on a two-hectare Hort16A (marketed as Zespri Gold) farm in Katikati on New Zealand\u2019s North Island.<\/p>\n

\"OA-Global<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen this orchard in New Zealand had the choice of deciding what to do in relation to Psa, they could have cut it out to the Bruno rootstock and re-grafted it, they could have tried one more year with copper sprays, or have done something different,\u201d Spencer says.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe chose \u2018different\u2019 and it paid for itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking at the orchard\u2019s historical data, it reached an export percentage peak of 88% before Psa damages forced a gradual fall down to 77.5% in 2013.\u00a0After ozone technology was introduced, this year\u2019s harvest yielded an export percentage of 93.51%.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe never\u00a0held out any hope that ozone would cure Psa and I don\u2019t believe that it does, but what it does do is it enables the plant to suppress Psa and its effects to the point\u00a0where the plant becomes healthier, leaf size is bigger, there is absolutely no outward appearance of Psa, and when the fruit was picked it was in better condition, less undersized than in previous years, and there were larger export percentages.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that\u2019s been very welcomed by the fruit industry in New Zealand, and Turners & Growers have now put ozone, as have a number of other companies, into kiwifruit orchards as a result of that trial.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says ozone treatment also reduces the need for fungicides and herbicides, as well as the use of copper spraying.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the increase of ozone we were \u00a0able to eliminate other treatments. For example, in New Zealand we have a problem with cicadas with hundreds of thousands of them before picking \u2013 they poo on the leaves, and that turns to fungus which causes leaf rolling.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo get rid of cicadas and leaf rolling in the orchards, you normally spray the orchards with citric acid. But because\u00a0there\u2019s ozone already in there, we didn\u2019t need to do that. They stayed away.<\/p>\n

Click HERE to learn more about ozone and food applications<\/a><\/h2>\n

Ozone technology and protecting plant wounds<\/strong><\/p>\n

But how does ozone technology work? When ozone comes into contact with a microorganism, the weakly bonded atom oxidizes the cell membrane, causing cell destruction before that bond breaks off and leaves oxygen as a by-product.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would appear that\u00a0ozone induces the plant to produce salicylic acid, which is an in-house immune system of the plant which helps it fight against pathogens and wounds,\u201d says Spencer.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you\u2019re in an orchard environment the plant naturally comes into contact with a number of wounds, like when you pick, prune, or if you\u2019ve got leaf drop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe plant is continually having its surfaces broken, and\u00a0when that happens you make the plant susceptible to any outside environment which is harmful to it, including in this case Psa which is an airborne pathogen.\u201d<\/p>\n

To clarify the last point, Spencer claims the frequent association of the vine disease with rain and wetter regions is incorrect.<\/p>\n

\u201cZespri have found it 7km up in a weather balloon; it\u2019s airborne, and it\u2019s circulating the globe. It is an air-transmitted pathogen without a doubt,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

A call for Chilean trials<\/strong><\/p>\n

Spencer now calls Santiago de Chile home, and has experienced some success with a variety of ozone-based products in the South American country. However, he sees great promise to repeat the positive performance of the overhead spraying system in kiwifruit orchards.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have been a lot of gold orchards already cut out of Chile because of Psa; it\u2019s killed them. Many people have lost\u00a0their livelihoods as far as kiwifruit orchards are concerned, and they\u2019re opting for other alternatives such as blueberries and cherries.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not saying this is the silver bullet for Psa, but what I am saying is that with ozone plants will have the ability to fight Psa and not be affected by Psa.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spencer thanks Chilean Kiwifruit Committee president Carlos Cruzat for his help with the new venture, but is waiting for a grower who is willing to take on a trial similar to the one that took place in Katikati.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got an excellent relationship with the Chilean Kiwifruit Committee. Carlos Cruzat has been very good to me since I\u2019ve been here, and he\u2019s tried really hard to get me an orchard to do a trial.<\/p>\n

\u201cChile would need to write its own protocol on how to apply ozone in an aqueous phase or application, because I don\u2019t know whether the aqueous spraying system would work as efficiently here due to the high humidity and the hotter weather, so we would need to block a trial,\u201d he says, adding the trial needn\u2019t be limited to gold varieties and could also involve green Hayward kiwifruit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are progressive and would like the opportunity to trial that out\u2026we know that it works. It\u2019s worked very well in New Zealand, it\u2019s been embraced by the New Zealand kiwifruit industry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spencer believes financial reasons and weather-related pressures may be behind the fact he hasn\u2019t yet sealed a trial in the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not insurmountable but there is a cost.\u00a0I think the price per tray is lower in Chile than in New Zealand, so the returns on the orchard aren\u2019t as high, which puts restrictions on any financial expenditure that an orchard would need to come up with to pay for ozone.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it\u2019s relative, but if you had a kiwifruit orchard that was overrun with Psa, you cut it out and put something else in, you\u2019re looking at three or four years before you\u2019re going to start to get a yield off the next crop anyway.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast year Chile was hit by heavy frosts for three days, and this year it had two days of frosts of which one was bad in particular.\u201d<\/p>\n

OA-Global is also doing trials with wine grapes in New Zealand to investigate how it works with botrytis. Spencer calls on Chilean\u00a0viticulturalists to come on board for a trial as well, and is also open to trials on a range of different fruits around the world where people are interested.<\/p>\n

New product in Chile<\/strong><\/p>\n

Spencer also highlights the company\u2019s refrigerated container units have just arrived in Chile, designed with the same principles to ward off bacteria from fruit as it is transported around the globe.<\/p>\n

\u201cChile has a long transit time to market, but we\u2019re now putting these units in containers,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s retrofitted into a carrier container, produces ozone and uses the circulation system of the refrigerated unit of the container.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are multiple settings for it for different fruit types; it\u2019s very small and compact, and it is inexpensive. It\u2019s actually half the cost of the competitor.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says the product weighs just 1.2kg (2.64lbs) and has been proven to work very well with\u00a0blueberries, grapes, apples and kiwifruit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re still conducting\u00a0trials for cherries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Click HERE to learn more about ozone and food applications<\/a><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NZ fruit growers embrace ozone tech for healthy orchards \u00a0 Read full article HERE After a successful trial on a kiwifruit orchard in New Zealand, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[124,125,126,127],"class_list":["post-430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ozone-food-processing","tag-ozone-fruit","tag-ozone-growing-organic","tag-ozone-kiwi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oxidationtech.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}