Shipping delays hit ranking
Bay slips in regional economic standings as exports affected
Hawke’s Bay has plummeted down the rankings for the country’s top regional economies — due largely to seasonal worker and shipping issues impacting the wine and fruit sectors.
The region slipped from second to 12th on the quarterly ASB Regional Economic Scoreboard.
The standings were released yesterday and highlight how New Zealand’s 16 regions are faring economically.
It was the first time in almost three years that Hawke’s Bay ranked outside the top five on the standings.
ASB chief economist Nick Tuffley said fruit and wine exports had been severely impacted in Hawke’s Bay, which was a major factor in the shake-up to the standings.
“Our research shows fruit and wine exports have been some of the most impacted by shipping delays and disruption, and the seasonal worker shortage is a big issue for Hawke’s Bay too.”
The scoreboard is calculated using a range of measures including employment, construction, retail and trade, and house prices.
The latest report compares the second quarter of 2021 with the same quarter in 2020.
Tuffley said other regions may have been harder hit by the lockdown, “so they’ve made a bigger
recovery over the past year”.
Te Mata Exports chief executive Peter Lange said the period between April and June was generally the peak time for exporting apples.
He said the big disruptions to shipping impacted how much apples could be exported, and there was a huge shortage in seasonal workers to actually pick the fruit.
“The lost crop from the lack of pickers in the first quarter flowed through to quite significant numbers for shipping.”
He said it was estimated that 1.5 million cartons of apples were lost in Hawke’s Bay earlier this year worth about $45 million, as a result of not having enough workers.
Hawke’s Bay Chamber of Commerce chief executive Karla Lee said shipping delays and high shipping costs were causing serious issues for Hawke’s Bay exports.
“We are a huge exporting region and this is our biggest problem now, supply chain disruptions,” she said.
“The prediction is it will get worse.”
Lee said it was a global issue but she called on the Government to step in and talk with the shipping industry about high shipping costs and delays.
“If our overseas markets can’t get products from New Zealand they will go elsewhere.
“These relationships that have been built over such a long time are facing serious problems if we don’t do something about it.”
Co-director Pat Turley said he was surprised by the latest standings as Hawke’s Bay had been performing strongly in other areas such as house prices and even retail.
“That is surprising to me,” he said. “I didn’t think the [shipping] disruptions were unique to our region.”