NOMINATION 02: "Delta Agrar" - apple orchard at 100 ha

Company "Delta agrar", a part of "Delta Holding", invested 5m EUR in the technology and planting of apple at 100 ha in Čelarevo during the last year. The orchard has 400,000 nursery plants of six sorts of apple, while the technology represents a combination of the proved technology of the Italian region, which is the world’s leader in production of that fruit, and “local know-how” in that area.

The apple orchard is a modern system and it includes anti-hail and anti-frost systems, weather station, as well as irrigation and nourishment systems. Total of 30 ha was planted with apple last year, while additional 70 ha will be planted with gala, breaburn, gold delicious, red delicious and green smith apples this year. Three hectares will be reserved for production of organic apples.

INNOVATION

The aim of the project is to completely change the technology and method of apple production in our country, and some of its elements make it one of the world’s state-of-the-arts orchards. Delta Agrar had to implement numerous sophisticated elements in order to achieve that.

These elements are irrigation and nourishment systems, which timely provide apples with necessary quantity of water and fertilizer.

The anti-frost system protects apples from spring frosts at the time when apples bloom, and it is efficient at the temperature of as low as -5 C. One-time operation of this system justifies the full investment in it.

The anti-hail system protects apples from bad weather and sun (which influence their quality).

The up-to-date machines for protection from diseases enable the weather monitoring (humidity, temperature, precipitations), and prophylactic activities depend on the acquired data.

All technology segments are run by skilled and educated agronomists.

Thanks to low concentration of oxygen, special ULO (Ultra Low Oxygen) cold storage plants provide fruits and vegetables with additional freshness during the whole year.

The final aim of this production is to provide large crops with high percentage of first-class apples because only such apple can be adequately stored in cold storage plants during the whole year, and its value will then grow by over 100%.

Such apple remains fresh during the whole year.

PUBLIC USEFULNESS

The orchard of “Delta Agrar” is situated in Čelarevo, 30 km away from Novi Sad, and it employs local manpower for necessary works during the whole vegetation season and, in that way, it creates jobs in rural environment, while the adopted technology is one of the latest in agricultural production.

COMMERCIAL SUCCESS

The growth of production and sales gives the grounds for assumptions that the apple orchard will achieve commercial success and that full production capacity will be achieved in time.

In five years, when the orchard enters the phase of full exploitation, it is expected that maximum production of apples will amount to 7 tons per hectare, which is twice as much as classical production – each tree should produce 17-20 kg of apples.

This orchard is designed to produce 60-70 tons of apples per hectare, while the yields of the world’s top manufacturers amounts to 40 t/ha (Belgium), 40 t/ha (Netherlands), 38t/ha (Italy). Average yield of apple in Serbia amounts to 15 t/ha.

The orchard has 6 different apple sorts at 100 ha and 4,000 nursery plants per hectare, that is, total of 400,000 nursery plants. It has 330 rows 1 km long, so that the total length of the rows planted with apples amounts to 330 km.

We must point out the crop directly depends on the class of apples. There are three classes, and the price of the first class may be up to 10 times higher than the price of the third class. According to this, the orchard is good not only if the crops are large, but also if the percentage of first-class apples is high. The share of first-class apples in the orchards of aforementioned manufacturers amounts to about 60%, while the orchard of ”Delta Agrar” has 80% of such apples.

OTHER INTERESTING INFORMATION ON THE PROJECT

Value of the investment is about 5m EUR.