About 160 jobs will go in Morrinsville when Meadow Mushrooms closes - but jobs will be created in Christchurch, where the company is expanding.
Chief executive Roger Young said the company regretted the closure and had worked hard to keep the operation going in recent years.
"It has been in continuous operation
for the past 56 years and it is with great regret that we must now close it. We are still discussing the situation with our 160 Morrinsville staff and hope to relocate some of them to Canterbury," he said.
The compost production facility at Taukoro Rd will cease operation by December 31 and all mushroom growing will cease at the Avenue Rd farm by the end of March next year.
The company has a head office in Canterbury and is owned by the Giles and Burdon families. The company's Morrinsville operation is known as NZ Mushrooms Ltd, and it is one of the biggest employers in Morrinsville.
The Waikato Times reported that neighbours of the Taukoro Rd composting plant last year successfully opposed resource consents for emissions from the plant, describing the stink as being like "dead cows".
The court found the smell was in breach of existing resource consents, and after compliance requirements were to be too expensive, the company decided both it and the Avenue Rd factory would close.
