EGYPT
Ali Shahata, the ARRA Egypt Manager shares with us info about the beginning of the season: “Climate conditions are continuously changing, they have led this season to be 7 – 10 days earlier compared to last year. Good quality is being achieved, and colour varieties are performing very well”.
The ARRA Sugar Drop™ variety, is looking very good throughout, ripening even earlier than usual and reaching high quality. This can be seen in the crop at the Daltex farm in El Minya, that boasts ideal bunch shape and size, and will be ready for harvest in the coming days.
ARRA Sugar Drop at Daltex: left El Minya Farm and right Salma Farm
The ARRA Sugar Drop variety is also performing very well at Blue Nile. They achieved the desired success this season reaching 9 tons per feddan, with high quality, despite the difficulties they faced, especially due to the salinity of the water.
ARRA Sugar Drop at Blue Nile
A true occasion for celebration is the first commercial plot of the ARRA Honey Pop variety in Egypt. In Technogreen’s Katta Farm the variety is grown with and without cover. The covered area is due to be harvested a week before the open area.
ARRA Honey Pop at Technogreen
You have the perfect opportunity to see these varieties in the
upcoming field days in Egypt 13/14 June
Ali Shahata and Eng. Fayez Dowidar, the ARRA advisory team in Egypt are super busy preparing for the quickly approaching ARRA Egypt Field Days that will be held on June 13/14.
Attendees will get a special look at the exciting new generation of ARRA Varieties including the extremely early and early tricolour stars. In the promo below you can see the team, at the first commercial plot of the ARRA Honey Pop variety in Egypt, which will be part of the upcoming Field Day tour.
VARIETY SPOTLIGHT:
ARRA PASSION FIRE™ EGYPT
This week we give centre stage to the early red, ARRA Passion Fire, with live examples, of the variety being harvested starting in the El Minya oasis in Egypt and then moving up towards the Delta. While you read these lines they are already being shipped to different markets in Europe, mainly Germany and the Netherlands.
In the below snapshots, you can see the variety’s beautiful, natural, full red colour, and until you have a chance to taste them yourself, you’ll have to take our word for it that the large, crunchy berries offer a fantastic eating quality. Additional striking traits include: good productivity, extraordinary hanging ability, shipping durability and shelf life.
Dakahlia Farm – El Minya
Ali Shahata and Fayez Dowidar visited the El Minya oasis in Egypt, located 245 Km south of Cairo, on the western bank of the Nile River, is well known for its extreme daytime temperatures as well as very hot nights. In such conditions, it is typically challenging for red grapes to develop sufficient colour as well as to obtain the desired berry crunchiness.
Nonetheless, they saw the beautiful results of ARRA Passion Fire at Dakahlia farm in El Minya, where their professional team followed the growing guidelines and have achieved a crop with excellent crunchiness as well as a full bright red colour.Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo.
More ARRA Red Factor happening at Dakahlia Farm
The ARRA Passion Fire variety is also ablaze on the desert road in PICO’s Mansouria Farm, where these bunches are perfect in shape, size and full vibrant red colour. Harvest is foreseen for the first week of June.
ARRA Passion Fire at PICO, Mansouria Farm
ARRA Passion Fire at Daltex Khier farm, Nubariya
Don’t miss the opportunity to see this beautiful variety and others
in the Egypt ARRA field day June 13/14
So, as you’re already in Egypt, we thought it is the perfect timing to share this ARRA dream team’s perspective on the Egyptian table grape industry.
Q: What are the unique conditions, main goals and biggest challenges of the Egyptian table grape industry today?
Fayez: There is no doubt that the very high production costs are the main issue.
Ali: In addition to what Fayez mentioned, I see that the lack of trained workers, along with the increase in their cost, has become one of the challenges facing growers in Egypt.
Q: What do you think are the main advantages of ARRA varieties compared to other grape varieties within your territory and how have the ARRA varieties impacted the table grape industry in Egypt to overcome the challenges you just mentioned?
Ali: From my point of view, one of the most important advantages that the ARRA varieties provide to the Egyptian grower is that they do not require much labour. So as we suffer from a labour shortage both in terms of number and quality, and the labour costs represent approximately 40% of the production cost, the ease of growth of the ARRA varieties is a huge advantage and extremely beneficial and efficient to the Egyptian producer.
Fayez: An additional asset is the ease of achieving production that is at or above the profit point, (9 – 10 tons per acre). Ultimately the factor that, I think, singles out the ARRA varieties is that so many of them are early and 80% of the needs of Egyptian growers are for excellent early varieties. This also relates again to financial efficiency as early varieties have short growing cycles, which translates to less irrigation, less agricultural inputs, and less labour time.
Q: What are the most popular ARRA varieties in your territories?
Fayez: At present the most popular ARRA variety is ARRA Passion Fire.
Ali: Currently accounting for the largest plantation area of ARRA varieties in Egypt. Since the Egyptian table grape industry excels traditionally in white varieties, it needs to increase its red varieties’ production to meet the evolving international market’s demand.
Q: Which of the new generation ARRA varieties do you think will have the greatest potential in Egypt?
Fayez: The newest ARRA varieties hold unique and striking characteristic. My personal favourites, that I foresee will be in great demand in Egypt are: the very early red, ARRA Fire Kiss™ (ARD42), the early mid stunning red ARRA Fire Crunch™ (ARD35) and the bold, mid-late red ARRA Cherry Crush™ (ARD36).
Ali: I agree, but I surely can’t leave out the exceptional early white ARRA Honey Pop variety, which really has it all and is optimally suited to the local conditions and needs.
Mexico
Meanwhile half way around the world in Mexico, the season is slightly later than usual.
Victor Romero, Videxport farm’s technical manager
closely follows Grapa’s growing guidelines, expertly adapting them, where necessary, to suit the farm’s location and microclimate, ultimately leading to these beautiful results.Victor reports:
“The season in Sonora, Mexico has just begun, which is unusual as typically the harvest starts in early May. The weather has been cooler than normal, causing a delay of 10 to 15 days in the harvest start date for all grape varieties. However, these conditions are helping us obtain grapes of a very good size and excellent quality”.
Early Sweet™ in Videxport, Gilberto Salzar, Luis Carlos Salazar and Victor Romero
ARRA Sugar Drop & ARRA Honey Pop at Videxport
Early Sweet at Campos Borquez
Stay tuned to more sweet news from Mexico in our next edition!
Join us in Egypt on June 13-14 for a special look at our exciting new generation of ARRA Varieties. Discover up close the extremely early red, black and white stars and explore commercial vineyards to get the large scale picture.
Save the dates California Field Days, the best place to see the full ARRA range, including the newly launched varieties, during the weeks of July 10th and August 21st. This year in Bakersfield, throughout these weeks, we will be offering small group visits to optimize your ARRA journey.
Details on registrations coming soon!
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