Welcome to this edition of Frankly Speaking – Seeka’s stakeholder update. There is a lot of activity going on as teams work hard to complete winter pruning, rushing to get the job done particularly in gold before Hi-Cane application. As we enter the short spray season growers are reminded that we must act responsibly and spray when conditions are right, and make sure that our neighbours are notified prior to spraying. You will all appreciate that there is a challenge to the Environmental Protection Agency about our continuing use of Hi-Cane. While this challenge will be considered after this year’s spray programme, you should expect that Regional Councils and Worksafe will be far more vigilant in their monitoring of spraying particularly in relation to NZS8409. This will have some impact on orchards that do not have adequate boundary shelter.
Labour continues to be a huge issue for us. Essentially, having saved over 275 pip-fruit workers from the Hawkes Bay – we then lost control of their repatriation and have been losing people who are going home out of sequence with when the work is completed. It is going to be critical to us that we have continuing access to COVID-19 free Pacific Islanders through the RSE programme and will put up proposals that will see Seeka taking accountability for their isolation on arrival. More to come.
Avocado export programme begins
The new season export avocado packing is underway with the air freight programme to Asia and sea freight to Australia having commenced. The early fruit quality looks great, although the fruit from the regions affected by drought is smaller than we would like. For the smaller fruit there is still the option of letting this fruit stay on the trees and size up, as the export programme is scheduled through until February next year.
Kiwifruit
In our kiwifruit business the teams have been focusing on inventory management and delivery to market orders. Seeka is 80% (12.6m trays) shipped for SunGold conventional and SunGold organic Seeka is 90% (500k trays) shipped which means the time pools late week adjustment for SunGold organic will be applied at the end of week 33 and SunGold conventional at the end of week 35. This mechanism has been put in place by Seeka Growers to limit a growers risk arising from long term storage. A grower with fruit in store when the adjustment is applied can do no worse than the industry average for fruitloss in the week the fruit is loaded out. This mechanism also means that when the growers fruitloss is better than the industry average in the week loaded out the grower gets the benefit of their fruit being better than the average. Feedback from the market is that the SunGold fruit quality remains good with no issues.
Seeka has now shipped 68% of its Hayward conventional inventory and there have been increased orders over the past couple of weeks to realign in market stock levels with market demand. The Hayward organic programme is 75% shipped, with no quality issues being reported for the Hayward category.
Vessel loading
Seeka is responsible for your fruit pre FOBS. Free on board stowed is the point the fruit is stowed either in a container or in the hold of a ship. Responsibly our stevedoring partner, TKL, has enforced a rule that means it couldn’t handle a vessel that hasn’t been at sea for more than 14 days, taking this decision for the good of the nation. Zespri called a vessel forward, asking it to arrive early, meaning it arrived prior to the 14 days gap. TKL refused to handle it until the 14 day period had been reached but now has been charged $70k demurrage by Zespri, even though this action was in the good of us all. Simply ridiculous.
2021 season planning
As we manage the last of the inventory to market the industry has commenced discussions on how it will operate in 2021 without Eurofins and what the taste programme will look like. Seeka Growers Council continues to be involved with this and Stew Moss is representing the Growers Council on the industry sub-group reviewing the taste system. This group is considering:
The taste programme is complex. This group has been tasked with ensuring the industry keeps what is good with the current taste programme while making changes to enable the programme to be operated outside of a spreadsheet.
As well as the taste review group there is another group looking at the requirements for sample collection and laboratory services. Tracy McLean, VLS Laboratory Manager is part of the group that are looking this.
These two review groups are finalising recommendations for the IAC sub-group to consider and be confirmed by IAC during August.
Your council has challenged Seeka to consider how it will operate the season next year and whether we too need to consider new policies and ways of doing things. This will be an ongoing discussion with your council over the coming months.
To the numbers:
Kind regards,
Michael
Seeka Key
Contacts