Kiwifruit growers have expressed acute misgivings about Zespri’s latest downward revision of kiwifruit (huakiwi), which has left Green growers with no payment cheque for February.
Amid rising concern among growers about Zespri’s ability to deliver a premium fruit product to market, New Zealand Kiwifruit Growers Incorporated (NZKGI) has fired off a sharply worded letter expressing “deep concern” and “extreme disappointment” at the latest payment downgrade announcement.
In the letter, NZKGI chair Mark Mayston acknowledges the industry is working collaboratively through a seven-point plan to address the last harvest’s quality issues. In late January Zespri informed growers to expect a downgrade of at least a 60c a tray on payment for Green fruit, due to an unforeseen losses incurred in the final two shipments of fruit, one to Europe and one to Japan. Organic Green growers faced a downgrade of 50c a tray.
NZKGI’s letter asks how Zespri executives could get their orchard gate return figure “so wrong”, pointing out that it was an extreme deviation from what growers had been told to expect back in November.
The letter does not mince words over grower concerns, challenging Zespri’s supply chain transparency, grower communications and forecasting ability. It says general grower confidence in the single desk seller is being dented.
In January growers were told those the downgrade figures are tentative, and come with a caveat they may be even worse, with a final figure to be announced on February 24.
The downgrade comes after the sector suffered its worst ever harvest for fruit quality, and follows an already downgraded crop payment. In August 2022 growers were informed of a $1.95-a-tray reduction in Green payments due to quality issues. SunGold growers had a reduction of $2.80 a tray.
Zespri CEO Dan Mathieson has been heading up a series of grower roadshows in past weeks explaining the losses and how Zespri intends to deal with quality issues for the coming harvest.
Insiders report the events have been well attended and voluble, with a Te Puke meeting hosting almost 200 growers, plus several hundred more online.
In the industry’s latest Kiwiflier newsletter, Mathieson acknowledges Zespri’s November forecast was “significantly” overstated, with the extent of poor quality fruit harvested in 2022 not captured by Zespri’s forecasting process.
He says the November forecast failed to acknowledge the level of customer claims coming in, with fruit continuing to deteriorate beyond expectations from October.
He says Zespri is reviewing and reducing or deferring corporate costs to respond to the current situation, balanced against projected volume growth in the 2024 harvest.
Expectations are this harvest may exceed 200 million trays.
