For the past five years or so the UK apple industry has been undergoing the most radical structural changes in its history. As a result it is becoming much more competitive, productive and focused, and thus able to begin replacing some of the northern hemisphere imports that, along with those from the southern hemisphere, continue to dominate the market.

The new standard is being set by the more progressive growers like Paul Mansfield, Melvyn Newman, Clive Goatham, Adrian Scripps, Nigel Bardsley and Sean Charlton. In recent years, these growers have invested many millions in new storage facilities and packhouses. And, arguably just as important, they and many others have been planting more productive and higher-quality varieties, often at the expense of Cox.

Cox apples no longer command the premium and the consumer following they once did. The variety's all-important Class 1 yield generally falls well short of that of Gala, Braeburn and newcomers such as Jazz, Kanzi, Rubens and Cameo. Furthermore, the younger generations of consumers prefer the firmer-textured, sweeter, less aromatic and less acidic new varieties.

Cox's decline

While Cox production seems certain to continue declining, it will remain our main dessert variety for some time in terms of area at least. However, English Apples & Pears chief executive Adrian Barlow predicts that it will soon be overtaken by Gala in volume.

"Year on year, there has been a decline in the demand for Cox," he affirms. "This has coincided with the increasing availability of Gala and Braeburn. Growers have recognised that these varieties provide a good opportunity for import replacement."

He says that to satisfy supermarkets' demand only around 24,000 tonnes of Class 1 Cox are required. But of the 46,000-tonne crop in 2008, 26,000 tonnes went to supermarkets. To persuade consumers to buy that much, the variety had to be on promotion for more or less the entire season. As a result he estimates that its price was some 20 per cent lower than normal. The rest of the crop went to wholesale markets, direct sales outlets, farm shops and for juice.

"There's a natural demand for Cox (sold in supermarkets) from people who think it's the finest apple there is, but there are not enough of them to take all of the crop," he says. "So the rest has to be sold to those who will buy it if it's cheap enough.

"The industry must try to restore Cox to a more profitable level by taking out orchards that produce lower yields and poorer-quality fruit."

Barlow insists that there is no future for anything but Class 1 fruit. But the norm for Cox is around 80 per cent compared with 85 to 90 per cent for Gala and Braeburn. That is what Cox must achieve and, if it does so consistently, it will remain a major variety.

Economic comparisons

Some growers, including Adrian Scripps, have acted in advance of Barlow's advice on grubbing Cox, while marketing company Norman Collett has asked its growers not to plant any more of the variety, at least for the time being.

Adrian Scripps, which grows some 400ha of fruit on five sites in Kent, has gone a big step further by grubbing its entire Cox area of 25ha over the past two years, replacing it with Kanzi, Gala and Braeburn.

"This does not mean that we might not come back into Cox in the future," says managing director James Simpson. "I'm not saying that it wasn't profitable, but it doesn't stack up economically compared with other varieties."

Apart from the fact that in most years more Cox is being produced than supermarkets can comfortably accommodate (see table, p35), "it's difficult to maintain a volume/ha of Class 1 fruit that makes it profitable at the prices being paid", says Simpson.

That volume, Simpson reckons, is around 40 tonnes/ha, and varieties such as Gala and Braeburn have little trouble in producing it. Cox's failure to achieve higher yields lies partly in its inability to crop on one-year wood like other varieties.

Worldwide Fruit managing director Robert Baliki agrees that in view of the generally superior quality and yield of the new bicoloured varieties, it is not surprising that they compete against Cox so successfully. This situation has been aided by the changing preference of most consumers for sweeter, firmer-textured apples.

"Growers have taken these changes on board and restructured their planting to suit the market," he says. "At its peak, Cox will stand up against anything but the irony is that because of the better yields and quality produced by its new orchards, it's becoming more competitive."

Boost for Gala

While the production of Cox seems certain to continue falling, that of Gala has been climbing. This season a record of nearly 30,000 tonnes of it was produced, 22,000 tonnes of which was sold to supermarkets - not far short of Cox's total.

"Within the next three years or so Gala will overtake Cox as our biggest variety and there is scope for more, but not vastly more," Barlow says. "Supermarkets should be able to take 25,000 to 26,000 tonnes of the Class 1 product and possibly more if technical advances enable us to produce higher-quality fruit over a longer storage period. Ten years ago people were saying that it couldn't be sold after January but we're now selling good-quality Gala into March."

While Braeburn lags well behind Gala in national output, Barlow expects its 2008 production of 9,000 tonnes to be doubled within four years. Although it does not eat particularly well until mid-December to early January, it can be stored and marketed in very good condition until May, he claims. And it offers considerable scope for import substitution from January to April.

He considers that the new club apples such as Cameo, Jazz, Kanzi and Rubens will all achieve useful market shares. Their Class 1 yields, which easily exceed that of Cox, are helping to breathe new life into the industry.

"All investment in orchards (of new varieties) is enabling us to be more competitive and sell higher-quality fruit over a longer period," says Barlow.

Investing in pears

While the future for pears seems to be less clear cut, Barlow believes that it has to be based on investment in much more productive orchards of the type common in Holland and Belgium.

A significant proportion of the crop, totalling some 23,000 tonnes last year, still comes from old bush trees, mostly planted too widely spaced. Britain is lagging behind its main competitors across the North Sea, but Simpson believes the UK will never be able to achieve their enviable yields, which average around double ours.

"I'm certain that the Dutch and Belgians get better crops because of their colder winters," he says. "We have shown that it doesn't matter how intensively you plant pears, you may still have to wait years for them to come into crop. You can have a fantastic amount of bloom in year one but often weather conditions mean it usually won't set."

Adrian Scripps grows some 80ha of pears and over the past four or five years it has replaced about 27ha of old orchards with new plantings. The new orchards are spaced at 3.75m by 1m (to give a tree population of 2,666/ha), trickle-irrigated and supported by a wire-trellis and post system. Its performance has proved Simpson's point: it has produced masses of bloom, very little of which has set - although he has high hopes for it this season due partly to the hard winter.

"We have produced as much as 50 to 60 tonnes/ha (across the board) some years but our average is only about half that," he admits. "A pear orchard has to crop from year one like Kanzi and Gala, otherwise why plant pears when apples like these are more profitable?"

Baliki, who is also a grower, agrees: "From my point of view it's better to pull out, say, 20 acres (8ha) of old Conference that produce a lot of small fruit and put in Jazz, Gala or Braeburn, which will be a lot more productive. Consumers want larger pears and so they need to be grown on soils well supplied with water and that's where the Dutch and Belgians score."

Referring to Cox, he says: "We must make sure that it's as good a product as the competition but we've let ourselves down many times. There was an attitude that we deserved a living. Just because you stick a Union Flag on your fruit doesn't mean that people will like it when they eat it."

He admits that although the marketing season (still ongoing in Bramley's case) has been challenging, prices probably would have been as much as 10 per cent lower had the pound remained strong against the euro. Unfortunately supermarkets had reacted to the recession by "chasing down prices" and so there was no premium on English fruit of equivalent quality to imported.

Another setback has been the high inflation of all growers' costs. To compensate them a fruit-price increase of 10p to 15p/kg would have been necessary but it was not forthcoming, says Baliki. Nevertheless, growers probably would say that they have had a satisfactory season financially.

Optimistic start

However, Barlow reckons that for many growers the season has been disappointing but by no means disastrous. They were optimistic at the start of the season because European crops were not excessive and the British crop was about average. Sales of southern-hemisphere fruit had been strong but after a good start to the UK season things began to go wrong.

"We ran into the global recession and there was increasing pressure placed on buyers to obtain supplies more cheaply so that retailers could cut their prices and thus increase sales," Barlow explains. "Another problem for growers was increased costs overall that we calculated were up 15 per cent over the previous year.

"The one exception (to lower prices) was pears, due to reduced volumes caused by frost damage across Europe" he says. "Our volume of Concorde was down 50 per cent and Conference and Comice by around 20 per cent.

"Surprisingly we saw little or no benefit from the weak pound against the euro," he claims.

"The main reason for this is that a lot of importers had bought sterling forward, enabling them to offer fruit at lower prices than otherwise."

Good support

Simpson views the season more favourably. His company has had good-quality produce that its customers paid a pretty fair price for, he claims.

"I think that the support our industry gets from supermarkets is very good," he maintains.

"If you talked to growers on the Continent you would find they would love the same level of support we get from our supermarkets. Realistically, we are not being paid under our fruit's market value.

"We are being exposed to fluctuations in currency that do cause us (price) problems at times," he adds. "So what we consider to be a good price in sterling can be undermined by the value of the euro increasing against the pound."

Despite the apparently very good fruit set across Europe, Simpson predicts that the coming season is not going to be an easy one. The reasons for this are that there is still a lot of French Granny Smith and Italian Golden Delicious in store that will be competing with southern-hemisphere fruit, as well as the prospect of a huge European crop.

Barlow is not very optimistic about the new season either. He anticipates that demand will not be very buoyant and there will continue to be downward pressure on prices.

"At this stage, however, we're expecting at least a reasonable season as I would hope that supermarkets will still want to sell English because of the good demand for local supplies," he says.

Class 1 English Apples/Pears
Volume (,000 tonnes)
2008/09 2007/08 2006/05 2005/04
Discovery 1.6 1.5 2.2 2.2
Worchester 1.5 1.5 1.0 1.3
Cox 29.1 29.7 26.0 39.0
Gala 22.1 20.1 15.0 16.4
Braeburn 7.1 7.5 4.7 4.1
Egremont 3.7 3.2 2.3 3.1
Total desserts 77.1 68.5 58.0 70.7
Bramley 24.2 19.0 18.0 21.9
Conference 15.1 16.7 14.5 14.3

England/Wales orchards
Area (hectares of trees)
2005 2006 2007 2008
Discovery 264 224 189 179
Worchester 167 154 124 123
Cox 2,783 2,380 2,128 2,088
Egremont 264 286 277 277
Braeburn 306 346 376 485
All desserts 5,410 5,030 4,810 4,860
Bramley 2,190 2,130 2,168 2,154
Conference 1,330 1,280 1,248 1,192

Changes: these tables show how the area and volume of the main English top fruit varieties have changed over the past four years (source: English Apples & Pears)