Kiwifruit

A vine fruit (Actinidia deliciosa and related species) native to central and southern China, where it grew wild for centuries before being brought into cultivation, first in China and then, in the early twentieth century, in New Zealand, where selection and breeding produced the fuzzy-skinned green cultivar that became the fruit's dominant commercial form worldwide. China remains the largest producer by volume, though New Zealand's marketing of the fruit under the name kiwifruit, adopted to distance it from its earlier name Chinese gooseberry, helped make it a major international export crop. Italy, New Zealand and Chile are also significant commercial producers, and gold-fleshed cultivars have become an important part of the crop's more recent market growth.