Six years of research by members of the New Zealand Tree Crops Association to find an effective natural preventative for cancer has reached an exciting stage.

The apple variety Monty’s Surprise, regarded as having the most potential to reduce the incidence of cancer, is involved in animal trials in Strasbourg, France.

Tree Crops’ collaborative partner, Dr Francis Raul, from the French National Institute for Health and Medical Research, is a colon cancer specialist and is testing a concentrated powder, made from Monty’s Surprise cider made in Wanganui.

Earlier cell culture testing conducted by Dr Raul on Tree Crops’ apple samples had found that cider made from Monty’s Surprise apples had shown the most potent anti-proliferative effectiveness against the colon cancer cell line tested – in fact just 0.02 grams per ml was able to reduce the proliferation of cancer cells by 80%.

It is the very high levels of procyanidin compounds present in Monty’s Surprise that is the most likely reason for this.

These compounds act in synergy with other compounds in the apple and cider to produce this anti-cancer effect.

Procyanidins are effective antioxidants and several successful antioxidant products are based on procyanidins, such as grape seed extract and pine bark extract.

The New Zealand Tree Crops Association now has a charitable trust (the Central Tree Crops Research Trust) which has been established to further the research.

Tree Crops members throughout New Zealand are now growing Monty’s Surprise: a very versatile eating, cooking and cider apple, that is ideal for organic growing due to its natural disease resistance.