Tropicana

'Tropicana' is Brazil's first released pitanga cultivar and the only one to come out of a formal public breeding programme for this crop. It was selected from accession IPA-2.2 and launched by the Pernambuco state agricultural research agency IPA (Empresa Pernambucana de Pesquisa Agropecuaria), which holds the largest pitanga germplasm collection in Brazil at around 120 accessions, and it is recommended for planting in the Zona da Mata of Pernambuco. Unlike the dark-fruited selections prized by North American collectors, 'Tropicana' is a red-fruited cultivar bred for commercial pulp and juice production, the market that actually supports pitanga growing in northeastern Brazil. In IPA's long-term evaluations it out-yielded the purple selections in the same trials, averaging 20.8 kg of fruit per plant per year over ten years under rainfed conditions, with the best purple selection (IPA-15.1) trailing it. Almost all Brazilian pitanga orchards are still planted with variable seedlings, which is what makes a defined cultivar like this significant.