IMPERIAL FRUIT SHOW

Southland Times, Issue 21092, 26 May 1930, Page 11

IMPERIAL FRUIT SHOW

NEW ZEALAND SUCCESS. FIRST PRIZE IN APPLES. (Per United Press Association.) Wellington, May 23. A cable has been received by the New Zealand Fruit Control Board that the first prize in the overseas section (Southern Hemisphere) at the Imperial Fruit show in London, has been awarded to a New Zealand exhibit. The prize is £lO and the class was open to growers, the associations of growers, packing stations and exporters in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the exhibit comprising five cases of dessert apples. The winning variety was Jonathan, but the grower’s name has not yet been ascertained. There were five entries fcpm New Zealand and there were also several entries from Australia and South Africa.

Another competition in which considerable interest is being taken is the British Empire section in which prizes of £5O, £2O and £lO are offered in each of two classes, one being for 10 cases by an individual grower or 25 by an association or packing station of any dessert apple, and the other for a culinary apple. These prizes are presented by the Empire Marketing Board. The results will not be known until the Canadian fruit has been examined. The New Zealand fruit will be examined on arrival and awarded marks, and such awards will be retained until the awards to the other exhibits have been made.

The Imperial Fruit Show has now been in existence for about nine years and an annual exhibition has been held without a break since 1921 in different cities in England. The show has always been held in the autumn as being most suitable for fresh fruits grown in Great Britain and Canada and it has therefore been impossible for Australian, New Zealand and South African growers to participate as far as apples were concerned. The autumn show for the northern hemisphere is to be held in October, but it was arranged to hold a spring show for the southern hemisphere of which the result for one section is given above. If the classes are well supported, and the experiment proves a success, it is highly probable that the spring section will be considerably enlarged. Growers are urged to enter apart from the prizes to be gained, as by doing so they will advertise Dominion fruit during the hight of the season in England. In the Empire section, the awards are virtually the championships of the Empire.