KEY POINTS:
New Zealand fruit growers say a shortage of workers will curtail earnings this year.
Farmers will have to make do with fewer than half the 24,000 workers needed to pick their produce quickly enough to meet the freshness and ripeness requirements of European importers, growers group Horticulture New Zealand said.
A shortage of 5000 workers cost fruit exporters $100 million in lost sales last year, it said.
New Zealand's record-low 3.8 per cent jobless rate makes it difficult for farmers to attract workers to short-term contracts when full-time jobs are plentiful in other parts of the economy.
"There weren't enough people last year to pick the fruit at optimum quality," said Jerf van Beef, Horticulture New Zealand's seasonal labour co-ordinator. "The losses to growers look like they'll be more than that this year."
Exports of fruit such as apples, pears and strawberries accounted for 3.5 per cent of New Zealand's $34 billion export trade in 2006, according to Statistics New Zealand. Threequarters of the fruit exports go to Europe.
Buyers including Tesco, Britain's biggest retailer, might pay $28 for an 18kg tray of fresh apples, said van Beef, a former fruit picker.
"If you pick it four to five days too late, it can't go to Tesco anymore because it's over-ripe," he said.
"Then we can only sell it on the normal wholesale market, which means just $11 to $12 for the grower."
Customers might shun New Zealand growers in favour of producers in Chile and Argentina if the nation's farmers could not deliver enough high-quality fruit, van Beef said.
The industry, which already depends on European backpackers and retired New Zealanders to pick fruit, is also turning to workers from the Pacific Islands to ease the shortage.
The Government will issue 5000 workers from the Pacific Islands with 11-month visas under a seasonal work programme starting in April.
"We just can't wait for the scheme, it will really take some of the heat off," said Jeremy Simpson, human resources manager at Mr Apple New Zealand, New Zealand's biggest apple grower, packer and exporter.
In the meantime, Mr Apple plans to hire up to 75 workers from Samoa to meet European demand during the next peak picking season in February.
Last week the Government declared a seasonal labour shortage in Hawkes Bay, allowing the company to recruit workers from overseas on six-month permits.
Simpson, who still hopes to meet demand from Europe, would have imported more workers had the Government declared the shortage earlier.
"Our pack house in central Hawkes Bay is looking like it will be down by as much as 70 per cent," he said.
Royal Gala apples will be the first to be picked at the start of the season, which runs from February to April.
Gary Jones, labour manager at Pipfruit New Zealand, the body representing apple and pear producers, said Royal Gala and Fuji apples were picked late last year because of a lack of workers.
"Of about 500 apple growers in New Zealand, 450 will be short of workers this year," Jones said.
"This will be the biggest shortage we've ever had because unemployment is at its lowest ever."
- BLOOMBERG
