KEY POINTS:
Employees of more than 40 years, and others following in the footsteps of parents and grandparents, must start all over again as the struggling sheep industry prepares to shed another 249 jobs.
Staff emerged from a meeting yesterday at the Silver Fern Farms processing plant, in the northern Christchurch suburb of Belfast, with an acceptance that redundancies were inevitable.
And while many will be able to find work elsewhere, the enormous history they have at the Belfast plant can never be replaced.
"It's a bit like death. Even though you expect it, when it happens it's a shock," said Lic Dawson, who faces redundancy after 46 years at the plant.
"At the moment I feel really gutted."
Silver Fern Farms is proposing to slash the plant's slaughtering operations because of dwindling livestock for processing, but has stopped short of closing the whole plant.
It follows the loss of hundreds of jobs at other meatworks around the country.
Seventy of the 249 workers facing redundancy would be offered jobs at other plants in the region, said chief executive Keith Cooper.
Mr Dawson started at Belfast as a 15-year-old "full of vim and vigour and cheek".
"In that time I have brought up a family and educated them and nourished them and housed them, and they have gone on to bigger things. Just like my father did before me."
One worker, who asked not to be identified, told the Herald he had worked at the plant for 42 years and did not know what lay ahead.
"It's just the way the industry's going. Everybody's struggling, all the companies are struggling.
"It's been expected, but it's still a bit of a shock when it comes."
Staff are to meet Silver Fern Farms management again next month for talks on the redundancy proposal.
