BETTER3FRUIT: COMMERCIAL RELEASES AFTER 10 YEARS

Better3fruit, a private company based in Belgium, runs one of the biggest apple and pear breeding programs in the world.
Each year we create 10,000 selections of apple and of pear.
At the time of its foundation in 2000, Better3fruit took over the apple breeding program of the Catholic University of Leuven.
In 2005, Better3fruit started a pear breeding program in the Czech Republic.
During its short existence Better3fruit has already released a significant number of apple cultivars successfully.
The first apple cultivars were released in 2002: ‘Nicoter’/Kanzi^® and ‘Nicogreen’/Greenstar^®. With approximately five million trees planted in 2011, ‘Nicoter’/Kanzi^® is currently considered as one of the most successful club cultivars of the past ten years.
Since then Better3fruit has also commercialized ‘Zari’, ‘Zonga’, ‘B3F44’ and ‘B3F45’. Other apple and pear selections are in a pre-commercial testing phase with external commercial partners all around the world.
Better3fruit’s work does not stop with the breeding.
We strongly believe in a guided market introduction in order to ensure that the fruit finds its way to the consumer.
For each cultivar, a different commercial strategy is developed, tailored to the cultivar.
Better3fruit cultivars are well-positioned in the market in order to generate ongoing added value for all the players in the fruit chain!

XIII Eucarpia Symposium on Fruit Breeding and Genetics

I. De Wit, A. Auwerkerken, A. Van den Putte

Malus, Pyrus, breeding, new cultivars, Belgium

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2013.976.11