No more willing workers to fill gaps: kiwifruit company

TAURANGA: The Bay of Plenty kiwifruit industry has reached the limit of willing local workers, and paying staff more will not make a difference, a picker and packhouse manager says.

The region needs an extra 1200 workers to pick and pack a bumper kiwifruit crop over the next month.

There are 6000 unemployed people in the area.

Kiwifruit company Apata employs more than 1000 people and will harvest and store about 10% of the region’s kiwifruit this year.

Managing director Stuart Weston told Morning Report yesterday about 60% of his staff were locals, the rest being made up of workers from the Pacific and backpackers.

He said he did not think raising the pay rate would attract more local labour.

‘‘We think that we’ve really reached the very limits of what’s available ready and willing to work, irrespective of the money.

‘‘And that’s evidenced by the fact that already [Work and Income New Zealand] have a system of stand down if people choose not to work in our sheds and inexplicable people will choose to go hungry rather than work in a packhouse.’’

He said the agency had been working hard to attract people to the industry but it had been having ‘‘decreasing levels of success’’.

Working with kiwifruit was hard work, and people who have been on an unemployment benefit struggled to cope with fulltime work and could be unreliable, Mr Weston said.

There were systemic issues such as multigenerational welfare dependence, and these would not be solved by asking a seasonal employer to throw them in a shed and work them hard, then wonder why they could not handle it, he said.

‘‘One dimensional answers just don’t work, we need far better quality conversations.’’

He said his staff’s pay ranged from minimum wage to $30 an hour. — RNZ