The first container shipments left Cape Town last weekend. The Namibian table grape export season is in full swing. The first significant container shipments left the port of Cape Town for Europe last weekend and are due to arrive in the UK in around 15 days.
Buoyed by excellent weather conditions and a bigger crop, growers in the Aussenkehr Valley in Southern Namibia all started packing at the beginning of last week. Around 60 containers a day have been leaving the valley for the journey by road to Cape Town since the middle of last week.
The Namibian industry is optimistic that it will reach its target of around 7.5mn cartons this season. In recent years export volumes have been holding around the 6.5mn carton mark after initial predictions that the industry would reach 10mn cartons by 2020.
In recent years Namibia has transformed its varietal profile, with the leading new varieties in the world replacing some of the older ones. It seems that these varieties are now making their mark and Namibia is set for growth of around 7 per cent every year for the next five years.
The early production areas in South Africa are also expected to start packing reasonable volumes soon. In its first crop forecast, South African industry organisation SATI predicted that harvesting in the early areas will be between seven and ten days later than normal.
