6 minute read
From the GM - Marcus Pickens
From the GM
Looking at the year ahead
MARCUS PICKENS
“WOULD YOU tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” asks Alice in Wonderland. “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” replies the Cheshire Cat.
Where do we want to get to in 2021 as an industry? And where do we - as your regional association - want you to be by the end of it? Here at Wine Marlborough, we hope for more opportunities and less challenges for 2021. Last year was difficult as we were not always in control and had to show how resilient we are as employees, family members, leaders and part of the wine industry.
If there is one learning I can take out of the 2020 experience, it is that we have the capacity and skills to deal with vagueness, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA) fairly well. It isn’t always fun to be in situations where you have to use these skills, but it does make it easier to deal with situations in the future where you may be required to deliver on these again. Congratulations to everyone for surviving and sometimes thriving, in a year full of forks in the road and many other obstacles.
For Wine Marlborough, our priority will be continuing work on our strategic priorities as we strive towards being recognised as the world’s greatest wine region. We will focus on four areas under the broad pillars of ‘educate, grow, protect and celebrate’. We want to share our work plan with members more easily too so you can see and track our progress against our goals.
Significant work will continue in addressing the labour challenges that have dogged us for many years now, but had the potential to become acute over the winter pruning period, summer viticulture season and particularly in the wineries for vintage 2021.
I want to continue working on changing perceptions of our sector. We need to make use of stories of Kiwis and locals who join us for the harvest period, and others who have remained here to showcase our industry and the many roles people can fill. For us, this will be almost as important as the recruitment of our workforce, and I urge those engaging these new people to capture positive stories and share them with us. I believe it is a very safe bet to say that the bar will continuously rise for us when we want access to international workers. We must demonstrate to the Government and our communities that we can attract and keep Kiwis in our workforce and keep lifting the numbers of New Zealanders and our locals involved.
We rely on seasonal workers, and while many more permanent full time jobs have been added through the years we still get pinned as an industry that is unattractive and seasonal. This needs to be challenged and pushed against. Why would an industry that is unattractive account for 6,088 full-time permanent jobs in Marlborough, or one in four jobs? These figures and more are part of the ‘Contribution of Wine to the Marlborough Economy 2020’ prepared by the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research (NZIER) and commissioned by Wine Marlborough, which we will publish and share with you.
We will also release our Labour Market Survey 2021, which looks ahead and models our workforce needs based on projected vineyard area growth and water storage plans.
John Murray Tapp Trading as:
Marlborough Labour Hire
12 Sutherland Terrace Blenheim
admin@marlboroughlabourhire.co.nz We are SSE AIP for up to 65 employees until 18/04/2021 Our service includes providing supervised labour on fixed term contracts and includes transportation to and from site. We can assist with viticulture and/or horticulture work and are keen to fill your ‘in between’ requirements, that call for smaller groups that your main contractor would rather not do. Being locally owned since 2011, and involved with the wine industry since then, we can also provide labour for factory, packaging and any other type of work as required. Email us to begin a productive discussion.
It will report back on information gathered from members, including growers and wine companies, wineries and viticultural contractors. Based on the report, we will be able to give insights into the vineyard labour force, demand for other services such as health care, how to attract and recruit people into vineyard roles and give forecasts on the winery labour needs for both permanent and vintage requirements. Thank you to co-funders New Zealand Winegrowers, the Marlborough District Council and the Marlborough Research Centre. Their funding, along with that of Wine Marlborough’s, has enabled us to undertake this project.
Another major focus will be in our marketing area. We are developing a significant marketing strategy to assist us with telling and promoting the Marlborough wine story, which will be focussed on our industry, our people, our products and to assist us being the window for the world to fall in love with our region and our wines.
This project has been on the cards for some months, but our turbulent year hasn’t enabled us to reach the start point. With no 2021 Marlborough Wine & Food Festival to distract us, we have a great window to work towards completion of this project by the end of April. The project will examine everything we do, allow us to undertake market research to identify what other regions or countries do for their members, and at the conclusion we will make recommendations to our board for KPIs to adopt and aim for. Being the flexible team we are, some projects and dayto-day tasks haven been passed from Sarah Linklater, our marketing and communications manager, to Loren Coffey, our events manager, who also has taken on some of the winery workforce labour challenges, by securing Ministry for Primary Industries funding for a winery cellar operations taster day, delivered in conjunction with Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology, and has continued to survey the needs of wine companies in their search for vintage labour.
Loren will also oversee our pre-harvest field day, popular with harvest operators, transport companies and the like scheduled for Tuesday February 23, and will organise hosting regional visitors and extended programmes for the Pinot Safari which is scheduled for February 21-22.
I look forward to welcoming Nicci Amour to the team as our new Advocacy Manager who starts in February. After harvest, there’ll be other activities such as #SauvBlanc Day, to be held on Friday May 7, before work begins on important activities such as the Tonnellerie de Mercurey Young Winemaker and Corteva Young Viticulturist, the Marlborough Wine Show and Celebration Lunch and hopefully the 2022 Marlborough Wine & Food Festival plus many more activities that will support your efforts.
Thank you for letting me share my view of what is on our work plan. If you have any comments or thoughts I am always keen to listen.
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