Vietnam now has more opportunities to ship dragon fruit, or thanh long
in Vietnamese, to some choosy markets such as the US, Japan, the
Republic of Korea (RoK) and China’s Taiwan in the coming time as local
scientists have found a new way to protect the fruit from melon fly
disease, a local newspaper reported.
According to the Saigon
Times Daily, the Plant Protection Department is cooperating with local
scientists in a study on sterilizing male flies which harm the dragon
fruit.
Male flies will be irradiated in laboratories before being
released into the environment, which make them infertile, meaning they
could not reproduce offspring when mating with female ones.
To
ensure the success of the method, scientists will make a calculation on
the number of male flies living in the environment in order to release a
greater amount of infertile male flies to compete with natural ones.
Le
Duc Khanh, head of the Division of Entomology under the Plant
Protection Department, said that the method helps prevent dragon fruit
from melon fly disease without using insecticide.
In 2013, only
2,600 tonnes of 400,000 tonnes of dragon fruit were exported to the US,
Japan and RoK as those markets impose strict regulations on insecticide
residues, according to Nguyen Van Ky, General Secretary of the Vietnam
Fruits and Vegetables Association (Vinafruit).
Vinafruit said a
kilo of dragon fruit exported to those selective markets is paid several
times higher than to China; however, local exporters have had
difficulty meeting stringent requirements.
For instance, dragon
fruit must be irradiated before delivery to the US or must undergo heat
treatment before being shipped to Japan. If Japanese importers find out
melon fly disease in any fruit, all batches of the product will be sent
back to exporters.
Up to 90 percent of dragon fruit harvested in
Vietnam each year are exported to China. However, recently, the General
Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of
China (AQSIQ) said it found insecticide residues in some batches of
fruit from Vietnam which are higher than allowed.
According to
Vinafruit, to diversify export markets of dragon fruit, melon fly
disease must be eliminated. Therefore, local farmers expect the new
method from scientists would help the fruit go to more markets.-VNA