Tuesday, March 19, 2024

People are the cherry on top

Neal Wallace
It soon became obvious the interview with Harry and Joan Roberts was near the pointy end of the stone fruit season.
Reading Time: 4 minutes

The long-time Central Otago fruit growers were amicable and generous with their time to accommodate an early December interview but the season was obviously ramping up, evident by the succession of staff requiring a piece of their time with inquiries.

They were diverse requests: questions about labelling details for the first pick of new season cherries, confirmation of exactly which block of fruit tree needed spraying and there was a constant stream of young people, many foreign backpackers, looking for work.

The Roberts will eventually employ about 100 pickers and packers from December to early March, a veritable United Nations, with about half foreign tourists.

But at the start of the season there were up to 30 a day inquiring for work, with most advised to come back later in the month when the season picks up.

In addition, they employ eight recognised seasonal employees (RSE) from Vanuatu and 18 permanent staff. Over winter they hope to recruit Fijians under the RSE scheme.

“The wage bill is pretty high,” he says.

H and J Roberts Orchard covers 60ha of flat and terraced hill country at Earnscleugh, across the Clutha River from Alexandra.

The family grows cherries, apricots, peaches, nectarines and plums, which provide a three-month picking season and gives casual staff some certainty of work for a period.

It also allows the Roberts to establish a nucleus of staff but he says they try to enhance that by generating a family atmosphere, given many staff are young and thousands of kilometres from home.

The Roberts family moved to Earnscleugh from Dunedin in June 1961.

His father was a plasterer seeking a career change but lasted only five months on the orchard before returning to his trade.

The two eldest sons ran the orchard for a while but when he was 16 Harry received some career advice from his headmaster.

“My headmaster told me to go home, so I did.”

He eventually bought shares in the family business, which was slowly expanding through the addition of more land.

In 1978 the partnership split with one block sold and Harry and his new bride Joan, the daughter of a local orchardist, bought the three remaining family-owned blocks.

It was a big challenge but he was heartened by the advice he received from a colleague.

“I had an older orchardist tell me ‘Harry, you’re a young bugger, just go for it’.”

Today their 60ha orchard is spread over four blocks and is run as a family business.

Daughter Vicki, son Harry and his wife Tasha and are active in the day-to-day business while third child, daughter Maryanne, lives in Central Otago and has also been involved in running the business.

On the walls of the packhouse smoko room photographs dating back to before World War I provide a snapshot of the development of Earnscleugh, the renowned Central Otago stonefruit growing region.

They include images of extensive tomato crops, part of a trial Roberts said was done by two Dunedin chemists, along with pipfruit and stonefruit trees.

Central Otago’s extreme climate lends itself to growing some of the best stonefruit in the country.

The driest region in NZ – annual rainfall is less than 350mm – it has about 150 frosts each winter while temperatures range from minus 21C in the depths of winter to more than 30C in summer with daylight lasting until 10pm.

One of Roberts’ earliest memories working on the orchard was being issued a 4m long wooden ladder and, being the youngest, told to pick the fruit from the top of the tree.

Trees were taller back then and the ladder heavy and unwieldy. Roberts recalled on multiple occasions ending up face-planted on the ground after the ladder became unstable.

Frost fighting was done by burning drums of oil, which left black residue in their ears and eyes, a practice that has long since ended, replaced by irrigation and other systems.

The job was physically taxing from lugging the boxes used when picking to shifting even larger boxes for shipping.

Roberts recalls loading trucks that took the fruit to the Alexandra railhead to be loaded into rail wagons for transporting to Dunedin.

While the end goal of producing quality, large fruit hasn’t changed, management has.

It has become less physically demanding and tools such as spray use more targeted.

“Spraying is about being green,” he says.

One change that is repeating itself is outside corporate interest in the industry, especially in cherries but also apricots.

Investors have recently started buying land in Cromwell, Bannockburn and Clyde and establishing cherry orchards, encouraged by demand, especially from Asia.

Roberts saw something similar in the 1980s when syndicated money was invested in orchards but it didn’t last.

Not suggesting that scenario will be repeated, Roberts says as an established family-run business, the outside investment makes him nervous because it can distort the sector and markets.

His first cherries were exported in 1980 and, depending on the season, up to 70% of his crop can be sold overseas but competitors are not sitting back.

The Australian cherry industry has migrated to the cooler climate of Tasmania and is taking the edge off NZ exports because of comparable seasons while Chile is a fierce competitor.

Roberts is working with a Chilean cherry expert to refine his crop management, a relationship proving beneficial by having someone outside the business look at what he is doing.

While operating a true family business is enjoyable, they enjoy meeting and mixing with the many young people who come and work for them, many who become lifelong friends.

“There are lot of lovely people out there,” Roberts said.

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