ASSOCIATIONS
INCORPORATING COLD CHAIN
The Great Fruit
Adventure
comes to SA
Fruit South Africa (FruitSA) has partnered with
The Great Fruit Adventure to help promote
awareness around the consumption of fresh
fruit and vegetables, especially among children.
T
wo explorers, Max MacGillivray and
Gareth Jones initiated the Great
Fruit Adventure when they took
their three-month motorbike trip across
Europe and Africa on 8 November 2016.
They kicked off at New Spitalfields
Market in London and reached southern
Africa on 11 January 2017. They visited
various fruit and vegetable growers in
Zimbabwe; Thipise region; Modjadjiskloof
in the Limpopo province; Tzaneen,
Letsitele, and Hoedspruit (where they
visited schools, farms and packhouses).
They also stopped by Nelspruit,
Hazyview, and White River; Swaziland;
and they continued to Bethlehem and
Harrismith on the 19 th . On the 20 th they
did Durban and the Sundays River in the
Eastern Cape from 21 to 23 January,
followed by Misgund and Langkloof
from 23 to 24 January. They then went
to several production areas in Grabouw,
Robertson, De Doorns and Paarl in the
Western Cape from the 25th until the
beginning of February.
FruitSA is a non-profit organisation
formed by the Citrus Growers’
Association of Southern Africa (CGA),
Hortgro (representing pome and stone
fruit), the South African Table Grape
Industry (SATI), Subtrop (representing
the avocado, litchi, mango and
macadamia industries) and the Fresh
Produce Exporters’ Forum (FPEF), to
address common issues relevant to the
fruit industry in South Africa.
“FruitSA wishes MacGillivray and
Jones all the best with the Great Fruit
Adventure. We are thrilled to have
you here in South Africa. And we look
forward to sharing the story of our
producers in the fresh fruit industry
through this epic adventure with many
of our end consumers in the United
Kingdom and further afield,” says Dr
Konanani Liphadzi, CEO of FruitSA.
“Fresh Produce is my lifelong passion
and I’ve put my heart and soul into the
industry, so I was dismayed to read that
six out of 10 British children had no idea
where the fruit and veg they eat comes
from. Something had to be done,” says
MacGillivray. With this expedition, he aims
to help educate children in the UK, as well
as internationally, to tackle the ongoing
ignorance of fresh produce and teach
them that fruit doesn’t just grow on trees.
The Great Fruit Adventure is a non-
profit campaign, the proceeds of
which (after the cost of the trip) will go
to a select number of Africa facing
nominated charities, viz: Fairtrade (www.
fairtrade.org.uk), Marshall Papworth
(www.marshalpapworth.com) and TUSK
(www.tusk.org).
When they return home, the duo will
visit schools and colleges and attend
events across the UK, to share growers’
stories, as well as anecdotes from their
journey. This will include the journey that
fruit and vegetables navigate daily to
find their way from Africa, to the rest of
the world. CLA
SA’s fresh fruit industry
exports info
• More than 50% of all agricultural
exports from South Africa is
fresh fruit.
• 2.7 million tons of fruit (out of 4.7
million tons produced) is exported
to more than 92 countries in the
world annually. The value of these
exports is USD2.5-billion.
• Major export destinations include:
EU, UK, Far East, Russia, Middle
East, USA and Canada.
The Great Fruit Adventure has been travelling the country to spread awareness about
where fruit and vegetables come from.
COLD LINK AFRICA • May | June 2017
www.coldlinkafrica.co.za
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