A Central Otago orchard’s cherry rescue project is moving ahead in leaps and bounds.

Cherry Corp started its cherry rescue project back in 2019, starting with its cherry cola in conjunction with the Citizen Collective - a pioneer upcycling food company in New Zealand.

Now several years later the orchard has 76 food and beverage ‘brands’ in the pipeline, using waste cherries from its Cromwell orchard.

General manager Reece van der Velden said Burger Fuel was stocking its charcoal-activated cherry cola, along with many supermarkets throughout the country.

There’s also lemonade in the mix, but due to commercial sensitivity, the rest of the products are still a bit of a secret.

Cherry Corp currently uses between 200 and 300 tonne of cherries each season for its products, and aims to be completely waste-free by 2030.

“We want to get that number up to 4000,” he said. 

“We want to rescue all the cherries in New Zealand.”

Eden Orchards, which recently opened its new juice factory in Alexandra, is also on a similar path, using waste cherries from many Central Otago orchards.

Reece said he was interested to hear from other cherry orchards that wanted to get rid of their waste fruit - to save them having to pay to go to landfill.