Bumper crop - too few pickers

Apples and Pears NZ chief executive Alan Pollard says it has a major programme underway to recruit New Zealanders to work in the sector in the main harvest period, which is February/March. He says his organisation is working actively with the Ministry of Social Development to recruit staff and is also looking at recruiting low risk prisoners to help. Students and senior citizens are also being targeted.

“Clearly there is quite a large shortage and we are especially missing the RSE workers. We would normally have about 10,000 of them, but we predict there will be about 5000 in the country,” Pollard told Rural News.

“Normally we have about 50,000 people on working holiday visas, but there will probably be about 10,000 and only a proportion of those will be available. So, we are struggling to find the number of people we need.”

Pollard says original projections by government put the number of unemployed in December as being around 8%, but he says this figure is now unlikely to be reached until June next year – after the harvest is over. He says a lot of people who are unemployed are staying in their regions hoping that things will improve. Mobility is another issue he says.

“Trying to get someone out of Auckland down to Central Otago creates a huge challenge, especially if they have family,” he says.

Pollard admits that some of the orchard work is hard and this doesn’t suit everybody. He says many employers are doing all they can to train new staff so that they can earn the maximum dollars.

But Pollard adds it is inevitable that an experienced fruit picker will earn more than an inexperienced one.

He says the next few weeks will be critical as orchardists do their best to recruit staff to harvest the bumper crop.

Pollard believes there is a risk that some of the apple crop will be wasted.