Work can be a smelly business at the Noen Soong central fruit market, 250 kilometres south-east of Bangkok, but the labourers might tell you it's just the whiff of money. The place is buzzing with workers wearing heavy gloves tossing football-sized spiky durians from carts to others stacking them in pickup trucks for transport to markets further afield and to packing houses that ship the popular smelly fruit to a growing overseas market.
Chanthaburi province is a fruit factory producing a wealth of tropical delights including rambutan, lychee and mango, to the more exotic dragon fruit and mangosteen, but to most people durian is "the king of fruits." The province bordering Cambodia grows about 500,000 tons of assorted fruit including about 220,000 tons of durian for export each year, Chanthaburi deputy governor Kriangdej Khemthong said.
The fruit known for its odour may be native to Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei, but Thailand is now the leading producer and exporter and Thais claim theirs is the most delicious.
Certainly Malaysians would not agree and consider their pungent durian crop the best. China recently agreed to accept durian from Malaysia - exports will start in July - so Thailand could see some competition where they have for decades virtually held a monopoly.
But for now Thailand, particularly Chanthaburi, remains the dominant player in the durian business. If fact, when it comes to fruit, Chanthaburi is the little province that could, and the heart of durian country. With less than 1 per cent of Thailand's 65 million people it produces 80 per cent of the country's durian exports and it is the only province where the majority of farmers grow durian.
"That's worth up to 5 billion baht (165 million US dollars)," Khemthong says. And this is a fruit banished from many hotels and other places because it smells bad to downright nauseating. Most airports in South-East Asia are durian-free zones. But many people just can't get enough of the fruit and more are learning to like it. "The market for durian is growing. It is particularly popular in China. Forty per cent of Thai exports go there," Khemthong says.
Taiwan, Indonesia and Singapore are also important markets, says Wirot Ngamrabiab, mayor of Noen Soong district, but so far little of the fruit makes it to Europe or the United States. Thai neighbours Malaysia and Cambodia also buy Chanthaburi durian, but they come and take it home themselves, so it doesn't figure in the export numbers, he adds.
Tossing spiky durians from cart to truck requires care, but harvesting is an even more delicate undertaking. One nimble harvester climbs from tree branch to branch searching for ripe durians and when finding one holds it by the smooth stem and drops it to a catcher holding an open burlap bag between his outstretched arms like a monster catcher's mitt that the spiky fruit first clings to then slowly slides to the ground. Dropping durian directly to the ground would bruise the fruit and damaged durian is not as good, one harvester says.
The future for durian looks to be getting better with the market increasing, but Khemthong makes it clear it takes effort to grow and weather will have a lot to do with it. This year the fruit is coming out later than usual because of the variable weather but it's a good crop. "Growing durian is difficult. It's like baby feeding," he says.