Taiwan is shipping 3,000kg (6,613 pounds) of sugar apples to Brunei, a Southeast Asian market that the island’s officials hope can help offset losses from mainland China’s ban on exports of the sweet green fruit.
Taitung county, where sugar apples help drive the largely agricultural economy, said the shipments began on Sunday and would reach six supermarkets in the small, wealthy Southeast Asian sultanate by February 13.
“Taitung county magistrate Rao Ching-ling indicated that, although the volume isn’t large, it opens a path to a Southeast Asian market, and she hopes to keep up this effort and gradually expand in the Bruneian market,” the county said in a statement.
Mainland China suspended imports of Taiwanese sugar apples, known also as atemoya or custard apples, in September 2021, citing biosafety fears over plant pests. But the Taiwan side said no “scientific proof” was provided, and it complained that the ban did not “comply with international rules”.
Taiwanese officials have urged domestic firms over the past seven years to steer business more toward the Southeast Asian market, with its roughly 670 million consumers, to diversify away from mainland China.
Sugar apples grow on 2,800 hectares (6,919 acres) of land in Taitung, according to the county’s agricultural figures. The data also shows that 4,355 tonnes of the fruit were exported worldwide between December 2021 and April last year.
Well-off Southeast Asian consumers will probably buy Taiwanese sugar apples as a “temperate climate” fruit that cannot be found in their tropical homelands, according to Ibrahim Suffian, programme director with the polling group Merdeka Centre in Malaysia.
“The Taiwan label probably means something of good quality,” Suffian said. “I think there’s a diverse market in this region that would enjoy products that are not just tropical fruits.”
But sales in Brunei will not offset the loss of mainland China’s market unless shipment volumes soar, said Chen Yi-fan, assistant professor of diplomacy and international relations at Tamkang University.
Taiwan import ban leaves some Chinese wondering where to get their food fix
“It depends on the amount Brunei will import, because China is a bigger market than Brunei,” Chen said. That said, he added: “Brunei would still be a breakthrough because Taiwan needs new markets.”
Taiwan will be hard-pressed to offset mainland China with other offshore markets, said Andy Xie, an independent economist based in Shanghai. He pointed to Beijing’s capacity to “hurt” Taiwanese growers with product bans and to compete with Taiwan in exporting goods to Southeast Asia.
“We’re going to see this kind of problem for a long time,” Xie said.
Beijing sees Taiwan as a renegade province that must be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary. And the island has been a diplomatic flashpoint in worsening US-China relations under both presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
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