June 27, 2025
Challenging growing conditions, disease threats and rising labor costs are just some of the challenges bird’s eye chili pepper growers face in Southeast Asia. Independent farmers in Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and Myanmar look to provide consumers with the highest quality peppers without sacrificing yield.
Bird’s eye chili peppers have strong domestic and international markets. Farmers need a crop that will stand up during transport and have a long shelf life, no matter if they are sold locally or exported. In Southeast Asia, most bird’s eye chili peppers are served fresh, which means the pungency of these peppers is also a top priority.
“The overall attractiveness of the fruit, a nice color, a nice shine and good uniformity are all aspects that we look for,” Ruud Berkvens, territory brand and customer head at Syngenta Vegetable Seeds says. “Transportability, firmness of the fruit and overall shelf life is important. You don’t want it to start wrinkling, drying up, or for the calyx to turn brown quickly.”
Navigating Agronomic Challenges
Southeast Asia faces a challenging growing season. The rainy season brings the potential for bacterial and fungal diseases. The other half of the year, the region will go months without rain. These dry months bring increased pressure from insects, like those that carry Chilli veinal mottle virus (ChiCVM).
Hybrids from Syngenta Vegetable Seeds feature ChiCVM and cucumber mosaic virus resistance. Syngenta Vegetable Seeds continues to invest in resistance breeding programs for hot peppers to give independent farmers in Southeast Asia another tool for disease protection, including those transmitted by insects.
Innovations to Fit Grower Needs
In Southeast Asia, the market continues to evolve with some areas seeing larger, more consolidated farms while in other countries, independent farmers harvest their entire crop by hand themselves.
“In Thailand and Southeast Asia, the bird’s eye chili is very labor intensive,” said Pichit Dansuknarong, Syngenta Vegetable Seeds Product Specialist – Hot Pepper. “It is such a small fruit. You can imagine that if you need to harvest it one by one the labor costs are very high. We have been focusing on making larger, heavier fruits so the laborer can harvest more in an hour.”
Launched three years ago in Thailand, Red Supreme 107 from Syngenta Vegetable Seeds starts out as a long fruit, near nine centimeters at the beginning. It maintains fruit size until the end of harvest, which ensures high yield also at the end of the crop cycle, without sacrificing the bright red color, pungency, shine and uniformity consumers want. This fruit size consistency is measured and tracked in the R&D process to find varieties that meet standards.
As the market for hot peppers in Southeast Asia continues to evolve, Syngenta Vegetable Seeds remains committed to supporting independent farmers through innovations in disease resistance, fruit quality and harvestability so independent farmers can continue to deliver the bold, spicy peppers consumers love.
Understanding the unique hot pepper market is an important focus of Syngenta Vegetable Seeds innovations. This expands beyond southeast Asia, for example, in India, a solar drying facility constructed by Syngenta India and Hand in Hand India provided local farmers with a place to dry hot peppers, eliminating a significant amount of labor. Also learn about our efforts in ancho and jalapeño peppers in Mexico.
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