From Silk Road to Supermarket, China’s Fragrant Pears
The New York Times
November 15, 2006
By DAVID KARP

JADE-GREEN Fragrant pears, with exotic provenance and a legendary reputation, have arrived in the United States for the first time after a journey that evokes Marco Polo.

The pears, as crisp as Asian pears but juicy and sweet like more familiar varieties, originated in far western China in the Xinjiang region. The area accounts for only 3 percent of China’s pear crop, but the Fragrant variety, which its farmers have cultivated for 1,300 years, is esteemed as the country’s finest, and fetches twice the price of other pears there.

The Fragrant pears, which have been exported to the United States since last month, are grown around Korla, a stop on the ancient Silk Road that is now an oil boomtown with more than 420,000 residents. West of the Gobi Desert and north of the Taklimakan Desert, Korla draws water from the Konqi or Peacock River, which flows south from the Tian Shan Mountains.

In recent decades Chinese government policy and market reforms have encouraged farmers to sharply increase pear production, which is expected to reach 12.5 million metric tons this year, more than two-thirds of the world’s supply. Virtually all are Asian pears, crunchy and ripe off the tree, not the European kind, such as Bartlett and Bosc, which develop their desired buttery texture and rich flavor after harvest.

Fragrant pears are fairly small and roughly oval, with long stems. The light green or yellow skin, with a reddish blush on some fruits, is thin and readily edible; the flesh is extraordinarily tender, crisp and juicy. The flavor is delicate, and different from that of most Asian pears, with a whiff of the “pear ester,” ethyl decadienoate, which gives European varieties their characteristic aroma. Ready to eat after harvest in September, they can keep in commercial storage for up to a year.

Xinjiang lies at the intersection of the ranges of Asian pears — which are mostly grown in China, Korea and Japan — and European pears, which evolved later in the Caucasus Mountains and Asia Minor. The botanical identity of Fragrant pears has long been unclear, and Chinese trade documents describe them as resembling the European species. In a study published in 2001, however, scientists analyzed the variety’s molecular markers and determined that it is a complex hybrid of the two main European and Asian species, along with Pyrus armeniacifolia, a little-known Xinjiang species with small fruits and leaves similar to apricot foliage.

Xinjiang’s political situation is unsettled, as an influx of Han, China’s main ethnic group, has fed separatist agitation and terrorism by the mostly Muslim Uighurs, who are now a minority in their homeland. Korla has long been renowned for its fruit — melons and grapes, as well as pears — and the Chinese government has sought to relieve economic pressures by promoting exports.

Chinese officials asked to export Fragrant pears to the United States in 1993, but American pear growers raised concerns that the imported fruit might introduce exotic plant pests and diseases. Only after repeated visits by Department of Agriculture scientists, pest risk assessments and revisions of inspection procedures did the department grant approval last December.

The only other Chinese pear allowed in the United States is the Yali (Ya) pear, or duck pear, a major commercial variety that is durable but mediocre, with tough flesh and bland flavor.

Jacky Chan, managing partner of YW International, a fruit importer, traveled to Korla twice this year to arrange for shipments of Fragrant pears.

“If I didn’t go, they wouldn’t have sent us the best quality,” he said in an interview in his office in South El Monte, Calif., east of Los Angeles.

The lengthy journey taken by Fragrant pears may not endear them to environmentally conscious shoppers concerned with food miles. Mr. Chan, 29, said that workers at the packing house in Korla use air guns to clean the pears of insects and debris, check them with magnifying glasses, and then cushion them in tissue paper and foam mesh sleeves for the journey ahead: seven days by truck, over small roads as well as highways, to Shenzhen, a port near Hong Kong; two weeks by container ship to Long Beach, Calif.; and another five days by truck to New York.

Several other importers are bringing in the pears, which are available at grocery chains including Hong Kong Supermarkets in New York, 99 Ranch Markets in California and H-E-B stores in Texas; they are also expected to show up soon at fancy New York markets such as Agata & Valentina and Dean & DeLuca.

Knowing that Fragrant pears would soon arrive from China, John M. Wells, co-owner of Viewmont Orchards, in Hood River, Ore., visited China in 2004 and brought back cuttings of the variety, which he intends to propagate and plant next spring.

“I’m trying to figure out whether the tree will grow here,” he said.