Development Actinidia chinensis is a plant native to mountainous areas of central China, including the modern provinces of
Hunan and
Hubei. While never formally cultivated, fruit of
Actinidia chinensis var.
chinensis were often harvested from the wild and sold at markets in China. During the early-to-mid 20th century, a market developed in New Zealand for a closely related green-fleshed variety,
Actinidia chinensis var. deliciosa, then known to New Zealanders as Chinese gooseberries. By 1959, cultivars that had developed in New Zealand were being marketed as
kiwifruit. In the 1970s, Chinese horticulturists began surveying wild
germplasm of
Actinidia species growing in mountainous central China, in order to develop cultivars which could compete with the popularity of New Zealand kiwifruit cultivars. While trial cultivars which were investigated and developed from the wild plants primarily focused on
Actinidia chinensis var. deliciosa, these surveys of wild plants revealed the potential for sweet, yellow-fleshed
Actinidia chinensis var.
chinensis fruit to be developed as kiwifruit cultivars. As a part of this work, seeds of
Actinidia chinensis var.
chinensis were imported from China between 1979 and 1981, from which the DSIR worked towards establishing gold and red varieties of kiwifruit, and cultivars of green kiwifruit which would mature more early in the year. Hort16A was the first commercially successful cultivar of
Actinidia fruit from a planned breeding programme. By 2001, 5.2 million trays were being exported from New Zealand. By 2001, graftings of the fruit were officially sold for propagation in Italy. The exclusive breeding and marketing rights for Jintao were sold to the Italian company Jingold in the same year, which facilitated its production in multiple countries, including Portugal, Chile, Argentina, and South Africa. In 2017, Jingold and China's government-run Wuhan Botanical Garden, jointly launched the Goodwei brand specifically for kiwifruit produced in China. In 2018, the Goodwei brand secured the exclusive license to introduce the Jintao variety to the Chinese market for the first time. In parallel, a distinct cultivar, Jinyan, was developed through a hybridization process in 1984, between Actinidia eriantha (female parent) and A. chinensis var. chinensis (male parent) at the Wuhan Botanic Garden. Since 1996, field trials of Jinyan have shown its ability to adapt to a range of climates, withstanding both high summer temperatures and cold winters, making it suitable for different growing regions in China. Extensive screening and genetic stability testing from 1984 to 2006 led to the official naming of Jinyan in 2009. It was granted Plant Variety Rights by the
Ministry of Agriculture of the People's Republic of China in the same year and was authorized by the National Forestry Cultivar Approval Committee in 2010. The China New Agricultural Science & Technology Co. Ltd., in
Sichuan province, holds the right to cultivate Jinyan in China, and it has since become widely commercialized for kiwifruit production in the country. Gold kiwifruit cultivars, especially Zespri Gold, proved to be popular internationally, making up a third of the total kiwifruit sales in the New Zealand industry by 2010. In 2012, almost half of New Zealand's yellow kiwifruit was lost, and within a few years, Hort16A (i.e. Zespri Gold) could no longer be widely grown commercially. By 2012, Zespri had begun marketing the cultivar as Zespri SunGold, and by 2015, approximately 30 million trays of gold kiwifruit were being exported from New Zealand, becoming the highest volume season to date. By 2018, almost all Hort16A orchards in New Zealand had been disestablished, and of Zesy002 orchards had been planted. As of 2022, two-thirds of the New Zealand kiwifruit market by volume was gold kiwifruit, and in 2020 gold kiwifruit composed 25% of the Italian kiwifruit market. As of 2023, Zespri SunGold is the most widely planted gold kiwifruit cultivar internationally outside of China, followed by Jintao. == Cultivars ==