Market Trends: What Tropical Fruiting Plants Show Signs of Future Success?

[FlyingFoxFruits]

The title says it all,

but without the members input, with thread would mean nothing at all.

I need members to fill me in, on what they think will be a great investment (be it for commercial ventures, or just a person who wants to grow fruit in their yard to eat)

and why you think this particular fruiting plant (species, cultivar, variety, etc...) is so promising now, and for the future fruit farmers.

Thanks very much to all who participate in this discussion.  After all, I might gain some insight from your comments that will bring me new ideas, and innovations I never before imagined. 

With that said,

I foresee plants that can be maintained in containers across a wide range of climates, which provide fruits of all types, with nutritional or medicinal value, as being popular plants, easy to market and sell.

The eugenias, jaboticabas, annonas, moringa, and garcinias have really caught my attention.

HOW ABOUT YOU! 

[nullzero]

Coming up with a criteria and rating system would work out better on selecting possibly candidates. A big difference if the fruit trees are being targeted or the fruit harvest. If its the fruit trees, then I think many of the things you brought up come into play.

Something to work off of.

Easy to Grow: 1-5
Fruit Taste/Texture/Presentation: 1-5
Container adaptability: 1-5
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 1-5
Drought Tolerance: 1-5
Health Benefits: 1-5

Example of how I would rate;

Mango
Easy to Grow/adaptability: 3 (would be 1 point higher but cold sensitivity holds it back)
Fruit Taste/Texture/Presentation: 5
Container adaptability: 4
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 3
Drought tolerance: 3
Health Benefits: 3

Opuntia sp:
Easy to Grow: 5
Fruit Taste/Texture/Presentation: 3 (glochids hold it back)
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 5 (fruits and pads abundant)
Container adaptability: 5
Drought tolerance: 5
Health Benefits: 4

Persimmon:
Easy to Grow: 4
Fruit Taste/Texture/Presentation: 5
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 4 (impressed by yield, 7 medium sized fruits for a small 5 gal tree)
Container adaptability: 5
Drought tolerance: 3
Health Benefits: 3

[Tomas]

Hi Adam,

I will just toss my random ideas about 3 new selected species that I think will be in high demand in the future once they become more well known:

Eugenia candolleana:
  * great container species
  * great taste
  * easy to grow
  * fruits in a few years
  * great fruit appeal
  * rarity will increase demand

Cordiera sessilis (Alibertia sessilis):
  * great container species
  * easy to grow
  * great taste
  * unusual, appealing blue fruit
  * rarity will increase demand

Eugenia pyriformis x Eugenia lutescens (Uvaia Doce Rugosa):
  * fruits in container
  * probably the sweetest of all Eugenia species (guess)
  * rarity will increase demand

Tomas

[FlyingFoxFruits]

NZ,

great ideas!

I still want people to have the freedom to just simply say for instance, "moringa is the plant I choose, because of its superior nutritional value, and quick life cycle." Also for people to be able to expound, why they are optimistic about a certain plant, in anyway they see fit.

a rating system would be great if everyone could agree on the categories being rated, and how to rate them fairly.

thanks very much for contributing, friend!

Tomas,

your predictions have been eerily accurate!  I'm wondering if you should have been a market analyst instead of a humble fruit collector?!

I will always consider advice from both of you (exemplary individuals and benevolent fruit collectors) very seriously!

thanks again friends,

for contributing to this thread!!

[luc]

The major problem is that a lot of good eating fruit , like we collect , has a very short shelf life and therefore cannot be marketed .

[FlyingFoxFruits]

The major problem is that a lot of good eating fruit , like we collect , has a very short shelf life and therefore cannot be marketed .

Aye,
but they can be marketed to a home grower!  So nurseries will see profits from growing such plants, and people will be eager to obtain them, and eat these treasures that can only be sourced by growing your own!

[nullzero]

Here some perennial vegetables;

Salad Burnet (Sanguisorba minor)
Easy to Grow/adaptability: 4
Fruit or Vegetable Taste/Texture/Presentation: 2 (eaten fresh slight bitterness, steamed or prepared in salad may be upto a 3)
Container adaptability: 5
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 3
Drought tolerance: 3
Health Benefits: 3 (used medicinally)

Black Salsify (Scorzonera hispanica)
Easy to Grow/adaptability: 4
Fruit Taste/Texture/Presentation: 4 (texture is excellent boiled, taste is creamy and neutral)
Container adaptability: 3 (would maybe bump, if planted in a deep pot)
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: 2 (atm, need some more experimentation to determine productivity in containers)
Drought tolerance: 3
Health Benefits: 3 (possibly 4)

Toona sinensis, deserves some focus as a nutritious green. It has strong anti cancer fighting compounds.

*edited* misplace of toona sinesis

[FlyingFoxFruits]

oh ya, what about coco de'mur!

they show signs of future profitability, but it's a long wait!  and a hard horse to jump on, and break in.

LOL

I wish I could eat these though!!! and expand it's fruiting range!

[Patrick]

Improved Dragon Fruit Varieties

[Mike T]

Forget flavor the market trends are dominated by tranportability,uniformity and color.Fruit should have a long shelf life and be of ideal size.Market forces are pulling back yard trees in different directions.So far as tree qualities go small size,harvest per area,speed to production and disease resistance are the qualities sought for growing mainstream fruit.In dry places being able to produce with less water is an advantage also.
For every culture there is a counter-culture and thankfully in defiance of such trends there is an emerging trend of fruit quality,flavor and local origin being highly valued.

[BMc]

The major problem is that a lot of good eating fruit , like we collect , has a very short shelf life and therefore cannot be marketed .

Luc, you have the market cornered on the next best marketable fruit! How long does the mexican garcinia last if packaged in a cool and dry area? The regular Achachairu seems to last quite a while - certainly long enough to be shipped from Oz to Europe and Asia and still be of good saleable quality.
We all know that trying to indtroduce something new to established industry and markets is much harder than growing them.

[FlyingFoxFruits]

annona squamosa!

fast in bearing from seed, easy to keep in pot,and push zone limits, also highly variable, easy to propagate, and self fruitful!

[nullzero]

annona squamosa!

fast in bearing from seed, easy to keep in pot,and push zone limits, also highly variable, easy to propagate, and self fruitful!

Annona cherimola perform very well for me in containers. Can't comment yet on yields (keeping only 1 on each tree). However, next flowering season I plan to hand pollinate as many as I can. Hoping to get 10 holding on each tree.

Here is what I would give it.

Annona cherimola
Easy to Grow/adaptability: 4
Fruit or Vegetable Taste/Texture/Presentation: 4
Container adaptability: 5
Fruit/Vegetable Yield: ?
Drought tolerance: 3
Health Benefits: 2

[luc]

The major problem is that a lot of good eating fruit , like we collect , has a very short shelf life and therefore cannot be marketed .

Luc, you have the market cornered on the next best marketable fruit! How long does the mexican garcinia last if packaged in a cool and dry area? The regular Achachairu seems to last quite a while - certainly long enough to be shipped from Oz to Europe and Asia and still be of good saleable quality.
We all know that trying to indtroduce something new to established industry and markets is much harder than growing them.

BMc , several years ago when we had this comparison tasting ( 5 fruit nuts ) between the Mexican Garcinia and the Achachairu brought by the Guatemalan grower , in which the Mexican one came out as the big winner we decided to do a lot more tests . All the results were posted on the yahoo rare fruit group . In short : Fruit can be picked still a little green and will ripen by itself - Can be frozen and keeps the same flavor - The riper the fruit the sweeter it becomes - Peel can also be eaten at that time ( 100% ripe ) - A very nice lemonade can be made out of the peel - All the other qualities and uses that the Achacha has in their publicity also apply to the Limoncillo .
I strongly believe it also has some medicinal properties but could not find a lab close by to do the tests .
When pampering the seedlings , they will start producing a lot faster ( example Ed Self ) and I noticed several flowerings a year on my single totally neglected tree .
 

[Tropicdude]

This is a post I wanted to think about some time, here are my thoughts.

Some well known fruits have a lot of potential for growth in the market,  the mango that we all take for granted here. is still an exotic in many parts of the country, and most people only have access to maybe one or two varieties.

The "trick" with mango in the US, would be to take advantage of latitudes north of Mexico, and very late season varieties, so you can meet the demand as Mexican production falls.  if one was to use UHD ( Ultra High Density ) planting, production in smaller areas can be had.

Almost anything could have a niche market.  many tropical Asian veggies could be grown for restaurants, or ethnic markets.  one off the top of may head, would be "Bitter Melon"  not only for the food market but also for health food supplement market.

Also the tendency in the US is for prepared products, so if you grow something and process it in some way, your chances of success and profits will increase. here i can think of Lucuma,  Lucuma powder is being used in cooking, but is being imported from South America and is pretty expensive.  In S.A.  Nestle even has a Lucuma flavored ice cream being produced commercially, and is the preferred flavor by some of the locals.  I see no reason why someone somewhere in the US with appropriate climate could not grow these, for making lucuma powder.

Improved varieties of almost any fruit or veggie has potential. as mentioned already Pitaya has a lot of room for growth.

all the above ideas are for "commercial" crops.  for the backyard grower, anything goes really. from Blue corn, to Ecliptica alba. 

Something doesn't have to be accepted by the masses like bananas to be a success,   speaking of which,  what percentage of the population you think has tried a manzano banana ? how many do you think would switch to manzano over those tasteless varieties sold in supermarkets if they had access to them?

For the D.R.  some future crops for export,  Mangosteen i see as having a good market.

One other fruit , with good success potential, is the "Jagua"  has a unique liqueur flavor, some medicinal properties, but its biggest potential is in the temporary tattoo market, for its natural dye. already one company in S. A. is taking advantage of this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZMmqWS9brU

Other Interesting fruits and plants
Camu Camu
Diesel Tree
Yacon
Some Garcinias
Argan ( For Oil ).

[luc]

oh ya, what about coco de'mur!

they show signs of future profitability, but it's a long wait!  and a hard horse to jump on, and break in.

LOL

I wish I could eat these though!!! and expand it's fruiting range!

Do you mean the ' cocco de mer ' love this erotic cocco , have one at my ex's place ( I lost it in the divorce ) hard and expensive to get...

[Tropicdude]

oh ya, what about coco de'mur!

they show signs of future profitability, but it's a long wait!  and a hard horse to jump on, and break in.

LOL

I wish I could eat these though!!! and expand it's fruiting range!

Do you mean the ' cocco de mer ' love this erotic cocco , have one at my ex's place ( I lost it in the divorce ) hard and expensive to get...

The nuts for these are supposed to be illegal to export out of the country, but collectors do get them.  I remember somebody sold one at an auction for like 800 dollars years back in Fla. that was sprouting.   yeah I would like to have one of these.  just make sure its no where near where you park your car or hang your hammock

[edself65]

I like Luc's and Tomas' picks of Rain Forest Plum and Mexican Garcinia!

Eugenia candolleana:
  * great container species
  * great taste
  * easy to grow
  * fruits in a few years
  * great fruit appeal
  * rarity will increase demand

Mexican Garcinia:
 Very easy to grow!
 Frost tolerant
 Even immature fruit that fall off early are edible
 Able to fruit in container
 Pretty Plant!

Ed