New sorting lines empower Xiuwen's kiwifruit industry

The newly introduced kiwifruit sorting line in Xiuwen county's Shangdong village was recently put into operation during the kiwifruit harvest season.

Ripe kiwifruit await the harvest in the orchard. [Photo/website of Xiuwen county]

As the birthplace of Xiuwen kiwifruit, Shangdong village boasts 8,000 mu (533.33 hectares) of fruit-bearing kiwifruit orchards with an average yield of around 1,500 kilograms per mu.

The manual sorting of kiwifruit suffers from low efficiency and often fails to meet order demand during the autumn harvest. The sorting line has a capacity of around 3,000 kg per hour, which would take 10 people an entire day to complete. It delivers precise weight grading and can pick out defective and malformed fruits. This has greatly boosted sorting efficiency, enabling fresh kiwifruit to be sorted and packaged rapidly to fulfill large-volume orders.

Kiwifruit are sorted on the line. [Photo/website of Xiuwen county]

Xiuwen county has a total of 137,000 mu of fruit-bearing land this year, with an estimated output of over 105,000 metric tons. It currently has 10 kiwifruit sorting lines in operation, enabling refined sorting and packaging, and helping to send Xiuwen kiwifruit to markets across the country.