Information for fruit and vegetables business in CIS
The packing and the opportunities for peach cooling impressed the participants of the AMP Orchard day in Odesa oblast
On the 8th of July 2005 the seminar "Modern technologies of production, pruning and marketing of peach and berry crops" was held on the basis of Ison farm and the farmer service cooperative Favorit, village Starokozachye, Belgorod-Dnestrovskiy rayon, Odesa oblast.
We should admit that such an "Orchard day", the practical seminar has not been conducted for a long time in Odesa oblast. Odesa is one of the leading fruit producers, so the interest to this event was really tremendous, more farmers-orchardists than expected participated in the seminar.
The objective of the event was to inform Odessa oblast orchardists about:
- the newest technologies of peach production (new method of peach tree pruning, utilization of the drip irrigation and biological protection systems);
- the post harvest handling technologies (sorting, calibrating, peach packing into the special cell boxes, post harvest cooling)
- the demonstration of the cooperation between Favorit cooperative and the Agricultural Marketing Project (AMP) in the framework of grant program; the granted equipment was presented.
The seminar was conducted in the partnership with AMI, Syngenta and Biotechnika Center companies, which presented their technologies.
The farmers-orchardists got a large amount of information about the novelties and production technologies of peach and berry crops (the American method of peach pruning; orchard drip irrigation' news in peach, nectarine, currant and strawberry selection; biological and chemical orchard protection systems; microfertilizers and growth stimulants, agricultural machinery).
The Orchard day was conducted in the period of peach harvesting, so that the farmers could evaluate the advantages of the American pruning method, demonstrated this February by Robert Belding, the American specialist; the farmers had also an opportunity to strengthen the skills of pruning and production normalization.
During the seminar the members of the service cooperative Favorit demonstrated the whole process of post harvest handling: sorting, packing and cooling. The seminar participants had an opportunity to see the modern packing materials for fruit sales using the trade mark developed by the Odesa AMP specialists. Dunapack-Ukraine Company presented a wide assortment of high quality corrugated board boxes.
The farmers had also a fruitful conversation with the producers of cooling equipment, packing materials, the processing enterprises; they provided the agricultural producers with the whole information on the cooperation terms.
In the framework of the Orchard Day the press-conference was conducted for the representatives of 13 mass media from Odesa. To the journalists' questions responded Andriy Yarmak, the Deputy Chief of Party, AMP; Alexander Lasinskiy, the coordinator of Odesa AMP office; Sergey Pukhkan, the chief of Favorit cooperative; Yuriy Sologub, the Senior Agronomist, Andriy Andryushko, the Senior Marketing Specialist, and Raisa Volik, the Senior Cooperative Development Specialist of the Agricultural Marketing Project.