South Africa is aggressively targeting a China entry for local stone fruits by the export season beginning from October 2025, onward.
According to Grond tot Mond on August 5, 2025, bilateral talks are ongoing for shipping peaches, nectarines and plums.
After visiting China in end July 2025, South Africa’s Minister of Agriculture John Steenhuisen came back with high hopes. He stated that a preliminary agreement in Beijing could come to fruition this September during the G20 Ag ministers’ meet.
Adding an icing to the wait is the fact that China’s 1.4 billion people are increasingly preferring organic fruits.
This at a time when Beijing has lately become as stringent as the European Union (EU) in aseptic controls.
Experts however strongly believe that the traditional organic status of fruits from South Africa will eventually win over China.
Among them is Justin Chadwick, Chief Executive at the Citrus Producers Association, who confirms the coming of China’s biosecurity standard inspectors.
Apart from enforcing biosecurity traceability of each fruit to its origin, Beijing will also require on-board cooling to reduce transit infection.
The requirements will be easy game, given that SA’s peaches and nectarines have traditionally shipped to highly strict Western markets.
Fast-tracking 2024-25 Exports
If the agreement hatches within 2025, it will bridge the southern hemisphere’s stone fruit marketing season that runs October through April.
Production is also at a tipping point, approximating 182 million kg for nectarines/ peaches and 93 million kg for plums.
In the recently concluded 2024-25 stone fruit marketing season, plums (prunus domestica) had the biggest share, at 13.8 million cartons.
Also impressive were peaches at 9.4 million cartons (16% yearly growth) and apricots at 678,666 boxes (50% growth).
Peaches at 1.6 million cartons were the only niche produce that recorded low 2024-25 growth, at -4% year-on-year.
Since quality is the centerpiece of stone fruit shipments, China is at an advantageous position as 82% of stone fruits from South Africa ship fresh. The story is no different for shipments to other destinations, based on the following production and export statistics.
South Africa Stone Fruits Statistics
Worth 3.85 billion Rand ($217.2 million) annually, with 1/3rd from plums, the South Africa stone fruit industry is economically important. The country produces around 350,000 tonnes of the fruits annually, of which nectarines and peaches represent 182,000 tonnes (2023). Since fresh fruits make up 82% of the annual sales of stone fruits, they have made traditional markets in the West. In 2025, plans to export them to China were nearing the breakthrough stage.
How much plums does South Africa produce annually?
In 2023, the plum and sloes output in SA turned the stone fruit margins at 94,288 tonnes, according to the FAOSTAT. Commanding the biggest harvest among its fruit category, the plum crop grows on 11,802 hectares (ha), as of 2023.
What is the nectarine, apricot and peaches portion in SA’s stone fruit harvest?
Based on 2023’s production data, apricots trail niche production at 24,887 tonnes while peaches and nectarines garner 188,048 tonnes. In acreage, apricots averaged 3,010 ha in 2023, behind peaches and nectarines’ 10,104 ha.