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Speaker 1: Now it looks like the avocado industry is bouncing back

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Speaker 1: from a few tough years. Rabobanks just got a report out.

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Speaker 1: It shows an increase of around two million trays for

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Speaker 1: the twenty four to twenty five season compared to the

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Speaker 1: previous season. Brad Siebert is New Zealand Avocado Ceom and.

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Speaker 2: Is with us.

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Speaker 1: Morning. Brad, morning, Hell, are you feeling optimistic?

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Speaker 2: We are, and we've got I guess all the ingredients

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Speaker 2: there for a better season ahead. So the optimism is

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Speaker 2: probably the word i'd use.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, what are the other ingredients?

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Speaker 2: We've had some better growing conditions. Obviously a couple of

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Speaker 2: storms in the last few years have already dampened some

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Speaker 2: of that optimism and some of our export volumes and

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Speaker 2: the returns for grows. So better growing conditions and hopefully

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Speaker 2: an expanded market, global market. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Have you managed to replace the crops that were lost

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Speaker 1: in cyclone Gabriel a couple of years ago?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean individual grows are impacted differently, and some

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Speaker 2: it's the crop that's impacted versus the trees themselves. Often

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Speaker 2: so those are bounced back and growth of the opportunity

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Speaker 2: if they look after their crop to get a good volume.

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Speaker 1: Why is the export price still as low as its

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Speaker 1: global competition.

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Speaker 2: It's purely that we've got over thirty countries now producing avocados.

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Speaker 2: We've got a bit of a unique window off season

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Speaker 2: to many of our offshore competitors, but we still compete

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Speaker 2: with the likes of Peru and some other large producers

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Speaker 2: in some of our key markets. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Do you think that that's the foreseeable future? Is it

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Speaker 1: going to be depressed by that competition?

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Speaker 2: Well, the world's growing avocados, but we grow the best avocados,

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Speaker 2: So we're trying to differentiate ourselves and really make sure

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Speaker 2: that people understand that there's something unique about New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: Brad, tell me what's going on. I noticed this year

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Speaker 1: for I think I think the first year that I

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Speaker 1: can really remember that we have had avocados on the

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Speaker 1: shelf all year in New Zealand and they haven't been crappy.

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Speaker 1: That actually been quite good. What's going on?

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Speaker 2: I agree it's exciting for consumers and we need more

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Speaker 2: people eating avocados in New Zealand to really support our growths.

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Speaker 2: But we harvest for over ten months of the year.

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Speaker 2: We're a unique crop in that way. We're able to

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Speaker 2: do that. We don't import avocados, so every avocado purchases

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Speaker 2: from one of our growers, so we have extended our

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Speaker 2: harvest window to meet export demand. I do so it's

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Speaker 2: allowed us to keep fruit on the shelf.

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Speaker 1: Great, Okay, so I can look forward to this for

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Speaker 1: coming years. What are you doing with your avocado? I'm

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Speaker 1: still just doing the average to the old classic avocado

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Speaker 1: on toast. What funky things are you doing?

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Speaker 2: You can't be avocado on toast, but I mean a

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Speaker 2: tagline of ours is amazing anytime, meaning breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

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Speaker 2: You can add it into your smoothie for lunch and

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Speaker 2: have a pretty amazing burgle with it as well. So

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Speaker 2: there is this style.

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Speaker 1: Got on your Brad, appreciate that. Brad Seabirt, New Zealand

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Speaker 1: Avocado CEO. For more on the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen

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Speaker 1: live to News Talk Set B from six am weekdays,

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Speaker 1: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio