As China's leading blueberry company with five farms in Chile to boot, Joyvio has been prioritizing globalization as one of its core strategies for a couple of years now, but how does it approach the issue of competition with other growing nations? At www.freshfruitportal.com, we speak with two representatives of the Legend Holdings-owned horticultural business to find out more.

Joyvio CEO Chen Shaopeng says that by coordinating facilities with climate conditioning, the company is now able to supply the domestic blueberry market for seven months of the year.

"We initially started with greenhouse production in the northern part of China, then fruits in unheated shelters in Qingdao, then outside production in Yunnan, outside production in Qingdao, and eventually outside production in Northern China," he says.

"We coordinate the facilities we have with different varieties, and in this way we could supply the market from March to the end of September."

Chen adds that since Chile is located in the Southern Hemisphere, its harvest season is complementary to China’s non-producing season.

"The harvest seasons of China and Chile are highly complementary to each other, and can exactly sustain for a whole year when added together. I believe there's no competition."

As for the U.S., Chen says that since its blueberries have not been approved to enter the Chinese market they pose no competition, even though the production season overlaps with that of China.

Joyvio chief scientist Jin Xixuan tells www.freshfruitportal.com that even if the U.S. does receive approval, it may not be capable enough to enter the Chinese market due to its production scale and distribution for export.

"The U.S. has been consuming a huge amount of blueberries itself; meanwhile it exports blueberries to Canada, Japan, Taiwan as well. So its producing scale may not be big enough to enable the U.S. to export blueberries to China. But in terms of other blueberry products, such as blueberry jam, there's still a possibility.

"Also, the shelf life of blueberries is a huge challenge. Even if it's in its most ideal condition, it could generally last for at most four weeks. The fastest transportation from the U.S. is by air, but considering the transportation cost, the blueberries' own price, and certain domestic protections, I don’t think it [exporting blueberries from the U.S. to China] would happen soon.

"So in the short term, for us at Joyvio, what we need to do is to prevent the U.S. competition from happening first. This is what we have been thinking about, but that doesn’t mean we’re afraid of such competition.

While admitting there might be a competition from the US producers, Chen Shaopeng openly welcomes the potential competitors for they can provide high-quality products.

"The U.S. blueberries will ripe around the end of June to August, some around early September. If China opens its blueberry market to the U.S., we would face competition to a certain degree.

"But the U.S. blueberries do have great quality, and their producers are highly professional. I believe all these would also motivate us to make progress faster."

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