San Diego Port Opens Doors to Fruit Imports From Chile

The first fruit-laden ship from Chile to dock in San Diego arrived Thursday, making the city an important West Coast port for the import of fruit from that South American country, port officials said.

The Bungo Reefer is the first of 14 ships to arrive between now and the end of April carrying fruit from the Chilean ports of Valparaiso and Coquimbo. The Bungo Reefer carried 3 million pounds of red, green and black grapes; nectarines; peaches, and apricots valued at more than $4.7 million. The fruit will be trucked to 14 Western states and as far away as Chicago and Houston, officials said.

Previously, most winter fruit arriving on the West Coast from Chile came through Los Angeles. But in September, Holt Cargo Systems, a large terminal management firm, bought nearly 200,000 square feet of storage space on San Diego Bay to increase the amount of fruit that can be handled here.

One reason Holt chose San Diego, port officials said, was because the port is willing to accept bulk cargo--such as boxes of fruit--while other ports will accept only container cargo.

About 25% of all Chilean winter fruit exported to the United States comes to West Coast ports. This will now be split about evenly between Los Angeles and San Diego, port spokesman Jim Anderson said.

Anderson said the new shipments will mean more jobs and more income for the city.

“It will put more longshoremen to work and will make that particular storage space an income-generator,” Anderson said. “Before, we were using that space to store fertilizer, and that is not the kind of income-generator that the fruit is.”

Other ports of entry for Chilean fruit are Tampa, Seattle, New Orleans and Galveston, Tex., which altogether receive about 10% of the fruit. About 65% is shipped to Philadelphia, for consumption on the East Coast. But Pat Balmes, a spokeswoman for the Chilean Winter Fruit Assn., said that, in time, San Diego will probably be receiving a larger percentage of the fruit.

“San Diego is now the closest port we have to Chile,” Balmes said. “They have the facilities now, and I think that it will prove to be faster to ship there.”

The modern, refrigerated ships that carry the fruit take about 12 days to make the trip from Chile to the West Coast. But ships traveling to the East Coast must go through the Panama Canal, adding a day or two, Balmes said.

All told, an estimated 654.5 million pounds of fruit, with a retail value of $818 million, is expected to arrive in the United States during this importing season. The Chilean growing season runs from January through mid-May, so the fruit does not compete with domestic summer fruit crops, Balmes said.

Balmes said that U.S. demand for fresh fruit in the winter has led Chile to expand its fruit-growing industry by nearly 30%. Half the grapes grown in Chile are eaten in the United States, she said.