Taiwan Fruit Hits North Chinese Mainland

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, July 29, 2002

Taiwan Fruit Hits North Chinese Mainland

Promotion drives for Taiwanese fruit are sweeping the city with at least 10 large supermarkets setting up special counters for fresh tropical fruits.

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Promotion drives for Taiwanese fruit are sweeping the city with at least 10 large supermarkets setting up special counters for fresh tropical fruits.

Sales girls are handing out colorful fruits in supermarkets andinviting passers-by to free tastings. Most of the fruits they recommend are strange to people in north China.

"They taste a little bit odd and their names sound odd," said one supermarket customer.

The 11-day promotion is sponsored by a Taiwan-funded agriculture company named Zhenglin, but it has attracted great interest from the whole agriculture industry across the Taiwan Strait.

Located in the subtropical zone, Taiwan is known for growing crisp, juicy and poison-free fruit and develops advanced technologies in fertilizing, protecting fruit from pests and keeping it fresh.

However, retailers were wondering whether local customers wouldlike the newcomers, said Fang Jianming, who is in charge of the purchasing department of a local supermarket.

Insiders noted that fruit from Taiwan would rouse new competition in the Chinese mainland market. China has promised to open the market wider to farmers of Western countries, but their prices is still too high for ordinary customers here.

The market in the north Chinese mainland has a larger potentialthan in the south which grows fruits similar to Taiwan's, said Zhang Liping, manager of Zhenglin's subsidiary in Tianjin.

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