Actinidia deliciosa (kiwi fruit)

Native to China, mainly in the southern and central parts, in mountain forests at 800–1400 m. Actinidia deliciosa is widely cultivated in many countries, including New Zealand, Brazil, Chile and Italy. The most common cultivar in commercial production is ‘Hayward’.

Overview: A dioecious (individual plants are either male or female), vigorous woody vine with large, leathery heart-shaped green leaves up to 25 cm across, which turn a reddish colour in autumn.

Flowers: Creamy-white to yellow, slightly scented and up to around 5 cm across. They are produced in the leaf axils in May–June and pollinated by bees. Female plants bear fruit if pollinated. Self-fertile cultivars have been bred.

Fruits: The well-known fruit is a brown-skinned, oval berry, up to 8 cm long, covered with fine hairs. The edible flesh is bright green with numerous tiny black seeds.

Hand-coloured lithograph of Actinidia deliciosa (as A. chinensis) by Matilda Smith, from Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (1914).

Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (Editor: Martyn Rix) provides an international forum of particular interest to botanists and horticulturists, plant ecologists and those with a special interest in botanical illustration.

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Cross section of a kiwi fruit (Image: Wolfgang Stuppy)

A New Zealand teacher, Mary Isabel Fraser, is credited with introducing Actinidia deliciosa from China to her homeland in 1904 after returning from a visit to a Chinese mission in Yichang on the Yangtze River. She arrived back in New Zealand with seeds of what was then called Chinese, or Ichang, gooseberry, and from these a local nurseryman produced plants that first fruited in 1910.

However, large scale commercial fruit production for the international market did not begin until the 1970s when the fruits of improved varieties were successfully marketed using the name kiwi fruit. The crop is now grown not only in New Zealand but also in Brazil, Chile, Australia, Italy (the world’s top producer) and elsewhere. In New Zealand it has escaped from cultivation and is considered to be potentially invasive in forests.

In China, the fruit is called 'yangtao', meaning 'strawberry peach', and has been cultivated for at least 300 years (there are over 400 varieties in China alone). Wild fruits are also harvested. Today, Italy is the world’s top producer of kiwi fruit, followed by New Zealand and Chile. The fruit is a good source of vitamin C, vitamin E and a range of B vitamins as well as dietary fibre. Actinidin, an enzyme present in the fruit, can be used as a meat tenderizer.

Research indicates that kiwi fruit could be of potential benefit in preventing and halting some processes that lead to cardiovascular disease.

Actinidia deliciosa makes an attractive ornamental climber.

Actinidia deliciosa can be seen growing in the Temperate House and in the Berberis Dell at Kew.

Fruits and seeds, catalogued under the name Actinidia chinensis, are held in Kew’s Economic Botany Collection, where they are available to researchers by appointment.

Search Kew's databases for more information on this species

Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (Wiley-Blackwell)

BBC Plant finder – Actinidia deliciosa

Flora of China (efloras) Actinidia deliciosa (listed as Actinidia chinensis var. deliciosa)