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Strawberries could be off the Christmas menu unless the government allows pickers to enter the country, according to the country’s largest producer.
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That’s the warning from New Zealand’s biggest producer. Source: 1 NEWS
It is an issue that was raised in the leaders’ debate last night, organized by TVNZ: whether to bring in much needed foreign workers to help the country’s desperate fruit growers.
The first strawberries of the season are already on their way.
In October, the fields will be ready for harvest, but the problem is that there is hardly anyone to collect them.
The vital foreign workers who make up the bulk of the collectors cannot get here due to New Zealand’s closed border.
Francie Perry is the nation’s largest strawberry producer, a multi-million dollar operation.
“It’s fundamental,” he told 1 NEWS.
“If the government does not allow some of these horticultural workers to cross the border, then the kiwi public will face very high prices for annual crops.”
The government says locals will take over, and Labor leader Jacinda Ardern said: “We have Kiwis out of work at the moment.”
Yesterday they announced that foreigners with expiring work and vacation visas can now enter horticulture.
Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor estimates that would mean some 11,000 people could fill the position.
“If you think there are a lot of harvest personnel here, where are they? Because we can’t find them,” he says.
Work and Income has found it with only eight workers. Nobody wants the hard work of collecting.
“It’s the worst kiwi response for choosing I’ve ever seen. Ever!”
Perry says he has the solution: Auckland accommodation ready to receive Covid-free Samoan workers.
“We have a facility that would be suitable for quarantine and we could quarantine 70 people and that would help us.”
She paid for everything and will even pay for security personnel.
But the government has not moved yet.
“If we don’t organize it in the next week, it becomes a real crisis,” says Perry.
Without pickers, potentially more than 1000 kiwi jobs will be lost at the packinghouse, and Christmas favorites could rot on the ground.
