Special Feature – The mahi behind our national fruit

THE MAHI BEHIND OUR NATIONAL FRUIT

| Horticare Services director Ben Steele near harvest end.

One of the farming sectors most affected by global border closures and thereby a lack of labour is horticulture. This has required some quick action and a flexible approach among orchard operators.

Farmlands shareholder and Horticare Services director Ben Steele looks after about 30ha of kiwifruit orchards, including 8ha of his own, in the Bay of Plenty. He has had to look at every aspect of his operation through a microscope since COVID-19 hit, as the cost of kiwifruit production skyrockets. Bay of Plenty-based grower Ben, 35, says that he feels the impact of climate change is also having an impact in his patch, with the seasons becoming increasingly unpredictable over the last decade. “It’s a pretty extended season this year. We are harvesting for at least a week or two longer than we were expecting to be or were last season,” Ben says. “The lateness this year started off as a seasonal thing, with the gold not maturing as fast as it normally would,” Ben explains. “That’s led to the green being pushed out because we didn’t get our gold done when we normally would. “Then in June we had some unfavourable weather and a few labour issues when we were trying to get the last of the green off.” The lack of backpackers has depleted one major source of labour and means Ben is running a team of 20 rather than the usual 26. “I did manage to score myself six backpackers for the picking and some Kiwi labour. So all and all, it hasn’t been too bad.” Ben had to get onto sorting his labour force very early this year, to ensure that when the time came, he would be well equipped for the pick. Being as pro-active as possible on this front was key. “I was straight onto it at the very start of March. “Having the season go later has made it interesting too, because the reality is that we're all fighting for the same limited labour pool in this region.”

| Ben's daughters Isabella, 7, and Julia, 4.

Ben, who has two daughters, Isabella, 7, and Julia, 4, has been chatting to his neighbours and other kiwifruit growers in his region a lot lately and while yield is up, many are facing a wide range of challenges. “They all have bigger crop loads this harvest, although some have struggled to achieve the desired taste that they are all after. Some of those with smaller crop loads have better taste and managed to harvest earlier in the season. “Most of the chat has been around securing labour, how we are going to get these jobs done into the future and the cost of production that’s now involved, which has just skyrocketed,” Ben reveals. The packhouses are introducing $22.10 an hour because of changes to Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme pay rates, which is the initiative that allows the horticulture and viticulture industries to recruit workers from overseas for seasonal work when there are not enough New Zealand workers. “That has basically made that the new minimum wage for us, which is a $3.20 increase in the space of one year, because ultimately I have to be competitive with the packhouses in terms of pay,” Ben says. Naturally, Ben supports the Government’s decision to extend Supplementary Seasonal Employment (SSE) and Working Holiday visas by 6 months. “The working holiday visa was extended for another 6 months for our backpackers in July and they can work in any sector, so the Government has pulled finger. Before that I’d already lost three workers who went back home due to the uncertainty around their visa situations. Hopefully this will provide some more certainty and help convince the rest to stay here. The main concern among kiwifruit growers is that eventually the backpackers who are still here now will go home and new ones may not arrive at all. We are very unsure when the next lot will come in, or whether they will come to New Zealand like they previously have, or not.”

Pruning and bud break

Ben had access to more staff over the pruning period, which helped get things off to a positive start. “The pruning period was pretty good. We still had the backpackers in the country so labour supply wasn’t really an issue. A lot of my guys head off to do the apples around February and then come back to help me with the kiwifruit.” Post-pruning, Ben didn’t encounter too many problems to speak of, with the exception of a few weather-related issues that caused some delay. “Bud break went off without a hitch and I had high flower numbers across my orchards in both green and gold. We did have a bit of an issue with the weather coming into our flowerthinning period but we managed to catch up later in the summer. “The season itself has been pretty normal but the picking has been crazy with very high crop loads, variable taste and some sizes not coming through. We may have just pushed our limits a bit too far this year, doing 20,000-plus trays of gold and 15,000 trays of green.” That is well up on Ben’s yield last year, when he produced around 17,000 trays of gold and 12,000 trays of green.

| It takes time to perfect the crop and achieve ideal taste.

| Livie Pitt on the pick.

He puts that down to a range of factors, most of which revolve around high flower numbers and ‘pushing the envelope’. “On the gold, I had started with high flower numbers and couldn’t get around to doing a second flower thin, which I normally would do,” Ben explains.” “So I just left the crop there, seeing that I did so well last year, thinking I’ll push it again this year.” Ben feels like he got his timing a lot better this season compared with last year in some respects including his management of labour. Ben explains however that it’s a huge job with a massive number of variables. “It looked like it was going to be a good dry-matter year but that turned out not to be the case. We are still learning and trying to perfect what we do and no one really gets it 100 percent right 100 percent of the time. “The costs of growing kiwifruit are just increasing year-on-year. The industry has also grown to be so big now and everyone’s just trying to keep up with that growth.” The contracting side of things still takes up a large portion of Ben’s time, despite him having his own 8ha patch now. “Most of my guys (across the remaining 23 hectares that Ben doesn’t own) have been with me for 8 or 9 years so I’ve got good growers who have similar goals to what I have. We are basically working together to pool our resources, make sure things are done on time and we’re all looked after.”

Family roots

Ben’s parents Graham and Tina bought an orchard in the 1980s and he grew up there, a move that opened more than a few doors and has set the trajectory for Ben and his young family 4 decades later. “I came back from overseas about 15 years ago, there wasn’t much work around, so I got into horticulture and started my own business 11 years ago.” Starting as a cadet with Grow Plus, Ben wasted no time learning the trade from the inside, getting in on the ground floor. “I ended up doing most of my cadetship through Satara, which is now EastPack. “I worked my way up to management and saw back then that there was an issue with having and maintaining good staff. The contractors they were using weren’t really up to it — so I decided to go contracting for myself.”

Varieties

Ben started off growing Hayward green, which is among the most popular varieties of kiwifruit and is the variety that launched and then sustained the New Zealand industry since the 1950s. The hairy green Hayward fruit was developed by horticulturalist Hayward Wright from seeds brought from China and was first exported from New Zealand by Te Puke’s Jim MacLoughlin in 1952. Then known as Chinese gooseberries, the term kiwifruit was first used in 1959 by Jack Turner of Turners and Growers. While the Hayward is still a mainstay, things have changed a fair bit since then. “There are new varieties coming out now but they do take a long time to develop and you need to be sure that they are suited to your climate,” Ben explains.

Steady improvement

The growth of Ben’s operation has required constant investment. “Infrastructure-wise, we have a yearly programme of converting the old timber pergolas to age-beam and bracing where needed. Where the old box end assemblies are, we're replacing them with strainers and ‘deadmen’ to help hold up these bigger crops. “We’ve done a lot of structural work. Some of the orchards we are looking after are approaching 40 years old,” Ben explains. The work rarely subsides on a kiwifruit orchard, especially when dealing with a later pick. “Because we’re running so late, we are going to be behind with our winter pruning,” Ben says. All going to plan, Ben and his crew should get a bit of a break from mid-September until the first week of October. “Once you’ve got sap-flow and you get your bud break — that’s when we tend to take a bit of time out.” The bulk of the kiwifruit Ben produces goes to Zespri and is exported internationally, with a little bit of class-2 going to Australia. “The better the taste, the better the market my fruit can get into. I try to limit my use of nitrogen so that they can store the fruit for as long as possible.” Ben’s Te Puna-based Farmlands Technical Advisor is Melina Williams, who keeps him well-stocked with spray products including insecticides and foliar spray, which is used from bud break through fruit development to prevent and correct nutritional deficiencies as the fruit matures. “She’s been absolutely fantastic, especially with the lockdown last year,” Ben says. “Before COVID I would always pick up from the store but after COVID I would just get my sprays delivered, which is just awesome when you’re busy, and we’ve carried on with that ever since. “She’s always there to help and if she doesn’t have the answers for me she will find someone within Farmlands who does.” Ben also chats to Farmlands Horticulture Business Development Manager Andrew McIntosh, who is based in the Tauranga Branch. Ben says Andrew is a useful source of information regarding products and new developments in the kiwifruit industry more broadly. “There are a heck of a lot of orchards in this area. The whole kiwifruit sector has just boomed and with spraying, having the correct information is just so important.” Ben reckons the sector is at full capacity in terms of the volume of fruit being able to be handled, with access to enough labour still a big limitation. “It does have the potential to grow even more because the demand is certainly there but a lot of it comes down to whether we have the labour to do that in the years to come.” The sector is booming, driven by high levels of international demand for our kiwifruit but there’s no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic and its ramifications have thrown up more than a few challenges. This is something that will continue to play out over the next few years but the passion among growers and their determination to produce to the highest standards they can does seem to be overcoming these challenges for now.

Words Randall Johnston | Photos Rich Brimer

| Livie Pitt and Jess Mclean get the job done. | Losena Taumoepeau hard at it.