Thirty-seven Thai fruits, including dried longan, durian, mango and fresh pomelo, will represent Thailand in the Beijing Olympics next year. Most of the items — 70 were proposed to Games organisers originally — are dried and preserved fruit. Songsak Wongbhumiwat, director-general of the Agricultural Extension Department, said that only fresh pomelo was allowed. It is very popular with the Chinese.

The volume might not be substantial but it is hoped that this Olympic exposure will help future Thai fruit sales in China. The products were selected from farms certified for Good Agricultural Practices by the Agriculture Ministry.

Hatairat Udomsin is company vice-president of Fruit Tech, a producer of vacuum-dried fruit which will supply dried longan. She has high hopes of success and said, ‘The China market is huge and joining the Beijing event could help Fruit Tech build a stronger business there.’

Fruit Tech has just signed a deal with Wal-Mart to supply a variety of vacuum-dried fruit to 200 Chinese outlets.

Hatairat Udomsin, seen in our illustration with some of the products, said, ‘All fruit — bananas, pineapple, durian and mango — are grown in a special system, organic with no chemical substances used in processing, on our 2,500 rai in Prachin Buri.’

What is a rai? Glad you asked that. It used to be a sort of informal measurement but now it is fixed at 1,600 square meters which is, of course, 0.0016 of a square kilometer.
Source: Bangkok Post