Raiders swoop on green gold
Avocado grower loses $5000 as ‘organised’ groups target orchards to supply black market
Avocado growers say thefts are skyrocketing and they are the targets of organised gangs supplying a black market fuelled by high demand for the pricey fruit. Bay of Plenty orchard owner Dianne Cheshire is feeling “wretched” after losing as much as $5000 of her crop in a series of repeated raids.
“It stings me to the marrow of my bones,” says Cheshire. “We know these trees as well as we know our children.”
She says other orchard owners she knows are suffering anxiety and broken sleep.
Full moon was a “lethally dangerous” time for orchardists, she said.
“We were hit on full moon on June 22. The whole of the Western Bay was aglow so
Dianne Cheshire
the thieves could whistle in and out.”
Last week Cheshire’s daughter and her young grandchildren noticed the light of two cellphones scanning the canopies of the trees in the orchard.
“By the time the police arrived with a dog unit they had made away in a getaway car.”
In another incident, Cheshire confronted two carloads of thieves in broad daylight.
“They were all women, with kids with them, all armed with plastic bags busy loading my fruit into them.
“When I approached, one woman said ‘careful lady you don’t have a heart attack’ and I replied, ‘if I do, at least I am guarding my hard earnings’.”
Cheshire believed the attacks were planned.
“They know what they are doing . . . they identify exit routes and put fruit in piles to come back to it.”
The volume of thefts convinced her that these were planned hits with a commercial outlet for on-sale — “either through retailers who are happy to accept fruit from non-traceable supply lines or farmers’ markets”.
A Northland avocado grower this week said thieves had stripped his orchard of up to 70 per cent of the fruit — a loss of about $100,000, which was pointless as the avocados were months away from being ready to harvest.
Graeme Burgess, of Kaikohe, said over three weeks the thieves had gone onto his orchard under the cover of darkness and raided most of the 550 trees.
The 75-year-old said the orchard was his sole source of income and he was going to be in financial difficulty following the theft.
New Zealand Avocado chief executive Jen Scoular said the association was aware thefts had been increasing, and there had been some prosecutions.
As well as warning orchards to be vigilant, lock gates and report suspicious behaviour, the association had distributed 150 laminated posters in the region warning that avocado theft was a crime.
Scoular urged the public to be wary of avocados that were very cheap and had stalks still on them, indicating that they had been raked from the tree.
“People should be okay to ask a retailer, ‘where did these avocados come from?’”
She had recently spotted “hot” avocados being sold at a fruit shop, and one of her directors was offered cheap avocados when buying sushi.
David Stewart, owner of Tauranga’s Fresh Market Gate Pa, said he always purchased fruit from his known growers but was aware the black market existed.
“We get calls offering and I just put the phone down.”
Avocados had come down from a high of $5 a month ago to $2 per fruit he said.
The reason? “Because growers fed up of thefts have actually picked early.”
Stewart doesn’t expect prices to come down any further. “They are a fruit high in demand.”
A police spokesperson said they were aware avocado thefts were an issue, and had “netted some good results”.
“Fruit thefts cause great distress to the orchardists who rely on their crops for income, which is why we want all the information we can get on suspicious behaviour in rural areas.”
The spokesperson said police were continuing to work closely with orchardists and said many were taking steps to improve security, including CCTV and setting up hidden cameras.
Police were also actively engaging and educating fruit shop owners in areas where it was believed that stolen avocados were being sold.
Cheshire has now put in security fences, used cameras and drones, and does not enter the orchard without her cellphone ready to call police, and has her staffordshire terrier Bruce at her side.
They know what they are doing . . . they identify exit routes and put fruit in piles to come back to it.