The domestic industry problems from the sweet cherry import situation and its development countermeasure for the future

Abstract: Sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) is one of the most popular temperate fruit, which commercially cultivated in more than 40 countries worldwide.Except in Chile, New Zealand and Australia, they are usually harvested from June to mid-July for their optimal taste and appearance.It was one of the most widely appreciated fruit for its taste, sweetness, colour and myriad of nutrients.Mostly consumed as fresh fruit, it is also dried, pickled, and processed into jam, marmalade, and fruit juice or canned.The price of sweet cherry is high than other fruits, the main reason that it play an important role in the disease prevention and maintenance of healthy life.The health benefits are linked to strong antioxidant activities, aid the weight loss, neuroprotective effects, and protect cancer preventive properties, pain from inflammation and arthritis and protection against neurodegenerative disease.The world’s total sweet cherry production was estimated as 2 185 881 tons.A rapid increase in cherry production is due to high consumer demands, leading to their increase in cultivation in China.It was estimated producing about 52 480 tons of sweet cherry in 2012, China had become the world’s largest producer of sweet cherry.At the same time, the quantity of imported sweet cherry had increased year by year with the development of market economy in China in recent years.The import quantum of sweet cherry reached 65 000 tons in 2014.The imported sweet cherries were mostly from Chile, United States, New Zealand, Australia and Canada.It still keep nice quality after a long-distance transport, which thanks to its good preserve freshness technique, coupled with graded and packed with the unified standard.While the higher prices of imported sweet cherry, it still popular by the majority of native consumers.A lot of imported sweet cherry poured into the domestic market will seriously influence the development of domestic industry of sweet cherry.Especially postharvest handling technology, cold chain transport, packaging technology, brand building and promotion of our country sweet cherry were relatively backward state.So put forward the higher request on postharvest field of our sweet cherry.An optimization of harvesting, handing, storage and distribution condition is most important and critical factor for practical purposes.The developments in packaging technique (modified atmosphere packaging) have positive relevance to extend the shelf life of sweet cherry.This paper comparative analysis the development situation, import and export situation, postharvest processing technology, packed and sold of sweet cherry at home and abroad.The great different between domestic sweet cherry postharvest handing technology and advanced level abroad was pointed out.The main problems with domestic sweet cherry in postharvest field as follows: (1) The unseemly time of harvesting time.In order to increase economic benefit, many growers make the sweet cherry come in earlier and at a better price.This behavior led to low weight, lighter colors and flavor of fruit, cannot achieve the original quality and flavor. (2) The lagging behind in postharvest processing technology.Lack of of postharvest precooling.A series of grading, screening, packaging, and transportation were done at room temperature, which shortening period of cold storage and shelf life, seriously reducing the economic benefits. (3) The incompletion of fruit circulation system.The characteristic of Chinese farmers is household management, which determines its sales rely mainly on wholesale and sightseeing and picking in production area, lack of the building of large-scale wholesale market of agricultural products. (4) Lack of brand awareness.Ignoring brand building and maintenance, the single recognized brands were fewer of sweet cherry, more attention to construction on regional brand. (5) Lack of guiding mechanism of associations.The industry of domestic sweet cherry cannot do unified standardization harvest, postharvest handing and packing, as well as lack of the specification of production listing period and price mechanism.Some suggestions were put forward: (1) Timely harvest, the fruits that harvested in proper time could reflect the best flavor and quality.The determination of harvesting time based on the color and soluble solids of sweet cherry. (2) Strengthening postharvest processing measures.Attaching great importance to the commercialization of postharvest handling, strengthening the measures of postharvest precooling, automatic grading, standardized pack and entire cold chain transport, as well as using the palletized forklift to transferred fruit to reduce the mechanical damage.In addition, the sweet cherry that storage and long-distance transport should employ the modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) technique coupled with preservative agents. (3) Attaching importance to brand building.Under the circumstance of the coexistence of opportunity and challenge, enterprises and cooperative should build famous brands and enhance brand consciousness, enhance the competitiveness of sweet cherry industry. (4) Enlarging government and policy assistance, government should encourage growers establish the professional co-operatives and association, supported the corporate champion, advocate reasonable rural land circulation to take the road of centralization and large scale. (5) Improving the fruit circulation system, the large scale wholesale market should be breaded, growers should vigorously develop tourism and build the sightseeing picking garden of ecological agriculture, as well as enrich sales channels of sweet cherry with the help of the platform of network.