Abstract

Raspberry production in Scotland has recently declined sharply in response to a number of factors including reduced financial returns, pests, diseases and harvesting difficulties. A marketing co-operative, Scottish Soft Fruit Growers Ltd, has secured a financial package for restructuring the industry that will also partially fund raspberry breeding and mechanisation of the harvest.
Progress on breeding for resistance to raspberry root rot, and the large raspberry aphid, adaptability to machine harvesting, the development of a RAPD fingerprinting technique for red raspberry and the descriptions of four new raspberry cultivars released from SCRI, 7815A12, 7815B8, 8044C9 and 8032A3 are described.