Vietnamese dragon fruit popular in America

Vietnamese dragon fruit is flying off the shelves at Vietnamese and Chinese markets in the US after exports of the fruit to the uber-economy resumed in mid-May, an agricultural official said.

Nguyen Huu Dat, director of Post-Import Plant Quarantine Center No. 2 at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said the May Hao and Hong Kong markets as well as the Nam Hung supermarket, all in the US state of Texas, had recently sold out of Vietnamese dragon fruit only days after a recent shipment.

Dat said those markets sold the fruit for about US$5 per pound, or $10-11 per kilogram.

The US opened its market to fresh Vietnamese dragon fruit last July. But the export of the fruit to the US was halted in February as exporters revamped their technologies, said Nguyen Huu Huan, deputy head of the ministry’s Plant Protection Department.

He said the exporters had worked to improve irradiation facilities to better preserve the fruit.

thanhnien, TT

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