Congestion at Napier Port could lead some Hawke's Bay fruit and produce exporters to use other ports while trying to get through the seasonal export peak.
"We may have to look at trucking to Tauranga," Murray Tait of Te Mata Exports in Havelock North said yesterday.
"It has got beyond frustration now and there has to be something they [Napier Port] can do to help." Mr Tait said there was always extra pressure at this time of the year when the apple trade got into full swing but this year had been the worst he had encountered.
"We are shuffling things - we have had some containers miss ships but the biggest issue is logistics," he said, explaining that getting trucks loaded, unloaded and returned to the packhouses had become a major problem.
Trucks were expected to be able to make six trips a day but at present it was only about four.