The road to recovery

Rebuilding After A Challenging Season

For some dried grape growers, season 2023 is a year like no other – and one they’d like to forget.

This year, for the first time in more than four decades, Dried Fruits Australia’s own chair Mark King won’t harvest a crop after his Pomona vineyards were either flooded by the Darling River, or suffered complete losses from downy mildew.

While some are ready to put season 2023 behind them, others have remained relatively unscathed and will harvest a good crop this season.

While the season’s not yet over, already we can look back and begin learning from a less-thanfavourable year to rebuild in 2024.

Back to the beginning

As the industry was ready to put season 2022 behind it, the Bureau of Meteorology announced a third consecutive La Niña event would begin late in the year.

These events typically increase the chance of above average summer rainfall in northern and eastern Australia.

A mild and wet spring and early summer meant vineyards were especially susceptible to the disease pressures of downy and powdery mildew.

“We had vines go under water when the Darling River went over its banks,” Mark explained.

“We built a three-metre levee, which kept water out of another 15 hectares. For the first time in 43 years, we will not be harvesting any dried fruit this year.

“We have looked through the different patches many times and the fruit is not there. The vines look OK, but downy mildew has taken the bunches. We are looking at pruning differently this year and have started already in some young vines by cane thinning, hoping to push new growth.”

Assessing the damage

Dried Fruits Australia surveyed growers to establish an estimate of the crop losses the industry might face this year.

The survey yielded 25 responses, which showed a wide variation in estimated losses.

About 90 per cent of growers had at least some impact by downy mildew outbreaks this season, with some estimating complete losses, while others were more fortunate to have less than 5 per cent of their crop affected.

In addition to estimating losses, the survey aimed to find out how DFA could best support its growers through the remainder of this season and into the future.

Among the issues to arise were chemical availability, timing of pest and disease alerts, and best practice information for seasons like this one.

Better access to information about varietal susceptibility to diseases was also raised.

Learning from season 2023

While DFA will continue to update growers on disease and weather alerts through GrowCare, there are several initiatives that will be added to better support growers.

DFA chief executive officer Thomas Cheung and field officer Stephen Kelly, through meeting with growers, will collect information to learn from this season.

Growers – particularly those who suffered few losses this year – will be asked to share their experience in the hope of supporting others to manage risks into the future.

Thomas said it was important to learn from this season.

“We need to make sure our growers have the best information possible to make sure they can make informed decisions around the effective management of their vineyards, during years where conditions are ideal, and those that are not,” he said.

DFA will this year develop updated variety fact sheets, which will include information on disease tolerance and susceptibility.

Looking ahead to 2024

Mark encouraged growers who had lost a high percentage of their crop to do the sums on whether it was worth harvesting this year.

“Look at the costs and returns, as well as how you will prune in 2023,” he said.

If in doubt, he encouraged growers to contact their processor field representative, or DFA, for advice and options.

Mark said while the season’s conditions would no doubt have an impact on this year’s total yield, he was optimistic about the future.

Despite being unable to meet the demand for Australia’s dried grapes, he was heartened that the industry was enjoying new growth.

“We have been actively telling buyers that plantings are growing and we would be looking for markets,” he said.

Dried Fruits Australia CEO Thomas Cheung echoed those sentiments.

“There is strong demand for our quality Australian dried fruits, both in domestic and overseas markets, and plantings are increasing,” he said.

“DFA will continue working with processors to establish market access and customer networks in 2023 to promote our industry and to build a solid foundation for an expected bumper 2024 crop.”v

Left: Dried Fruits Australia field officer Stephen Kelly with grower Warren Lloyd in the field to assess the 2023 season so far. Right: Some growers suffered large crop losses due to flooding and downy mildew.

As the table grape season hits its stride, growers are advised to “hold firm” and harvest only mature fruit that meets the minimum maturity standards.

Early season results gleaned from Nielsen IQ, conducted with Nielsen Homescan panellists who had purchased Australian table grapes from 1-7 December 2022 showed somewhat “concerning” results.

Consumer acceptance fell to 70 per cent for red and green grapes – below the 80 per cent threshold and “significantly lower” than the start of last season, according to Nielsen’s Angela Carter.

Black grapes, while achieving lower consumer acceptance rates