Abel Duarte Alonso

School of Marketing Tourism and Leisure, Edith Cowan University, 100 Joondalup Drive, Building 2, Joondalup, Western Australia 6027, Australia. Email a.alonso@ecu.edu.au

Following the steps of the wine and olive industries, growing truffles is becoming a new and alternative rural activity for a number of New Zealand farm and land owners. Found under the surface of the ground in some forests of France, Italy, and Spain (Crop and Food 2004a), truffles are increasingly being introduced as experimental crops on New Zealand soil. For centuries truffles have been used as a component of gourmet foods, and have become a culinary tradition in some European countries. Now this tradition appears to be slowly catching up in New Zealand’s gastronomic environment. Truffles are a type of edible mushroom and are mainly used to add flavour to cooked and uncooked dishes; their importance in some circles of the gastronomic world is comparable to products such as saffron, foie gras and some great wines (Crop and Food 2004a). While their production and price have decreased in the last 100 years, truffles can still reach thousands of dollars per kilogram, with the white truffle being often the highest priced variety, reaching as much as $US 13 000 per kilogram (Crop and Food 2004a, 2004b).

While still relatively small, there is evidence that the truffle industry in New Zealand has been developing in the last decade, and the potential of this industry appears to be enormous. According to Rural Delivery (2006), “the NZ truffle industry is poised for substantial growth, with over 100 truffières (truffle plantations) already established, from small lifestyler and hobby farms, to large commercial plantations of up to 8000 trees”.

In late 2006, a study of truffle growers in different New Zealand regions explored owners’ motivations, the challenges they encountered in their developing industry, and any future goals. Because only very few truffle operations could be identified using phone databases, books, and magazines, contact was established with the New Zealand Truffle Association to disseminate a questionnaire among its members. While only 20 truffle operations participated in the study, this low number of respondents is not surprising. One report indicates that because of the potential value that truffles might fetch in future harvests, many growers preferred keeping their identities secret (Wairarapa Times-Age 2005).

The results showed that 18 (90%) respondents planted between 10 and 320 trees to grow their truffles, with only two planting a higher number but not exceeding 600 trees, thus demonstrating the small size of the majority of the operations. Only four (20%) of all 20 respondents indicated already producing truffles and 80% were still waiting to obtain their first harvest, suggesting the developmental stage of most operations in this study. Amongst respondents’ most important reasons to grow truffles were creation of a retirement investment, making a profit, and passion for the truffle industry, while change of lifestyle was not an important reason for them to be involved in truffle growing. Lack of knowledge of growing truffles was the most challenging area faced by growers, illustrating that many respondents embarked in truffle growing as a hobby rather than as a business. Gaining more recognition for the quality of their truffles was not a challenging area for growers, possibly because the majority of respondents were yet to harvest their first truffles.

For the most part, search of external advice for developing their truffle business was very limited amongst growers, particularly with regards to marketing their truffles, or financing of truffle operations. The majority of respondents (60%) viewed a cooperative approach as the most important option to market their truffles, with 55% having the intention to market their truffles in New Zealand. Only two (10%) respondents were already marketing their truffles, and eight (40%) growers planned to export their truffles overseas.

A total of 15 (75%) of respondents indicated making no earnings at all from their truffles to date, once again possibly as a result of not having harvested any truffles yet. Only one respondent indicated that approximately 5% of his/her income derives from truffles and three did not answer the question. Are these three producers perhaps the only ones already reaping benefits among all growers in this study? The secretive nature of the truffle industry in New Zealand might hold the answer.

References

Crop and Food Research. 2004a. Tuber melanosporum – Périgord black truffle. Available at: www.crop.cri.nz/home/products-services/publications/broadsheets/t-melanosporum.pdf

Crop and Food Research. 2004b. Tuber magnatum – Italian white truffle. Available at: www.crop.cri.nz/home/products-services/publications/broadsheets/t-magnatum.pdf

Rural Delivery. 2006.  New Zealand truffle growing industry. Available at: www.ruraldelivery.net.nz/absolutenm/templates/featuresTemplate.asp?articleid=354&zoneid=6

Wairarapa Times-Age. 2005. Secretive truffle growers keep their booty well hid. Available at: www.times-age.co.nz/local/news/secretive-truffle-growers-keep-their-booty-well-hi/3660162/

About the author

Abel Duarte Alonso's research interests include business-related areas concerning small and medium enterprises (SMEs), urban (e.g. hospitality) and rural (e.g. wineries), as well as wine consumer and winery visitor behaviour.