Normal bread supplies should resume shortly

Bad news: The Taranaki gas leak has caused a shortage of bread in shops and supermarkets around Northland.

Good news: Supplies should return to normal early next week.

No or low supply of the basic grocery item has affected households for the past two days as Vector works around the clock to fix the gas leak that has also affected major businesses like Fonterra.

Quality Bakers, a subsidiary of Goodman Fielder, has obtained emergency gas approval and said normal supplies should resume soon.

"There's been a temporary shortage of bread. We were out of operation for 36 hours after the gas leak and during that time, we brought limited supplies from the south end of the North Island," Goodman Fielder spokesman Ian Greenshield said.

Dargaville Four Square had to turn customers away on Thursday after running out of bread.

"There's only a handful [of loaves] today [yesterday] which should only last until midday. It's only a quarter of my normal supplies," owner Amitesh Lal said.

"There are a lot of upset customers but they understand the situation. I've had to turn away quite a few customers yesterday [Thursday] ... You can't do anything."

Omapere Foodmart owner Yogesh Kumar has had no bread for two days because supplies did not arrive on Thursday and yesterday. "There's nothing we can do about it. I had to turn people away," he said.

Ahipara Superette owner Kiran Patel has had no delivery for two days. "I usually buy between 50 and 60 bread daily and my supplier said I'd get some bread at midday [yesterday] but they may or may not arrive," he said.

Kaitaia Pak N Save has had shortages until a truckload of bread arrived yesterday morning.

Opononi Four Square owner, who identified herself only as Ruth, said her limited supplies were all snapped up by 2pm yesterday.

She had had enough supplies for the past two days to keep people happy.

"We've just had Tip Top bread. Nothing's come through from Quality Bakery. They may be a fresh delivery tomorrow [today] but we're not sure," she said.

Reports suggested the country could face a shortage of other basic grocery items such as cereal within days.

The manufacturing sector had been worst affected by the gas leak since Tuesday.

Northland farmers have already dumped more than eight million litres of milk after Fonterra plants in Kauri and Maungaturoto could not operate without gas. The two plants are now operating again.