The Te Mata Mushrooms Company store and farm in Havelock North which is set to close. Photo / Warren Buckland
The Te Mata Mushrooms Company store and farm in Havelock North which is set to close. Photo / Warren Buckland
Large Hawke's Bay employer Te Mata Mushrooms is suspending production at its headquarters on the outskirts of Havelock North after 55 years at the site - with most of its workers set to lose their jobs.
In a statement on Thursday, Te Mata Mushrooms Ltd said it "was very disappointingthat we need to close the facility" on Brookvale Rd.
"Staff will remain employed while final crops are picked and supplied to customers over a month to six weeks," the statement read.
"Currently Te Mata Mushrooms has 110 staff and over time this will be reduced to a skeleton staff of 10-15."
A Te Mata Mushrooms staff member, who did not want to be named, said "the whole thing is heartbreaking" and "there were a lot of tears" during the announcement to staff on Wednesday.
The company plans to build and open a new facility near the Central Hawke's Bay town of Takapau in the future.
It is unclear when that new facility will be built, but a resource consent is currently being processed and designs finalised.
No detailed plans have been revealed for the future of the existing site on Brookvale Rd, but the company hopes to use at least part of the 50ha site again in some capacity.
Te Mata Mushrooms changed ownership on April 1, with Hawke's Bay-based equity firm Due North Ltd Partnership increasing its shareholding from being a minority shareholder to full ownership.
Te Mata Mushrooms has been based on the outskirts of Havelock North for over 50 years. Photo / Warren Buckland
The company has received complaints in the past from nearby residents about bad odours - and was fined $15,000 in 2016 and $26,000 in 2018 over discharges of offensive odours.
The company was long considered a rural site and hit back at a fine in 2016 which it labelled was the result of "urban creep", with housing expanding toward the plant over the years.
Te Mata Mushrooms Limited chairman John Seton said in the statement on Thursday that the 50-year-old Brookvale Rd facility was no longer fit for purpose under "the current regulatory regime", and with "the pressures caused by urban encroachment on established agricultural production".
Te Mata Mushrooms was approved a loan of $19.5 million in 2020 including for construction of a new facility in Central Hawke's Bay - at the time it announced the site was planned near Waipukurau but has since shifted further south.
"Our future location is best placed to be in Central Hawke's Bay, which will bring economic benefits to the area as well as new jobs for local people," Seton said.
"We still plan, however, to be back growing mushrooms on our Brookvale facility using compost made at Takapau."
Hastings Mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said it was sad news.
"While Te Mata Mushrooms has said they hope to be back growing mushrooms at the Brookvale site at some point, it is very sad to hear that in the meantime this long-standing business is closing.
"Our thoughts are with the staff who are losing their positions.
