German-owned company Beehive Demetra Ltd purchased Patutahi orchard near Gisborne, a 61ha site with an apple orchard on about 40ha of it. Photo / Craigmore Sustainables
German-owned company Beehive Demetra Ltd purchased Patutahi orchard near Gisborne, a 61ha site with an apple orchard on about 40ha of it. Photo / Craigmore Sustainables
A foreign interest that sees potential in the future of Gisborne’s apple industry has purchased 61 hectares of land for an orchard.
German-owned company Beehive Demetra Ltd bought the property at Lavenham Rd and Judd Rd in Patutahi and McFarlane Rd (Waituhi) for an undisclosed sum from the family trusts that own growing business Judco.
Beehive Demetra was formed last year and is a subsidiary of German insurance company Munich Re, which was formed to invest in horticultural assets in New Zealand.
The Linz overseas investment decision said about 40ha was already used as an apple orchard.
“[Beehive Demetra] will upgrade the existing orchard and plant an additional 16 hectares in a new apple variety on land that is currently used for cropping,” the decision said.
“The main benefits to New Zealand are likely to include capital expenditure, increased jobs and increased export receipts.”
Craigmore Sustainables chief executive Che Charteris said his company could see a significant need for more "patient long-term capital" in New Zealand's apple sector. Photo / Juliette Capaldi
Craigmore Sustainables is a New Zealand-owned rural investment company providing governance and management services for Beehive Demetra.
Craigmore Sustainables chief executive Che Charteris said this was Beehive Demetra’s first purchase in Tairāwhiti.
“It’s just a great growing region. It has had its ups and downs with the cyclone, but it has early-start apples.
“The first apples in the country come out of Tairāwhiti and it has excellent growing conditions, good fertility and it is a pretty practical community as well.”
Charteris said there was about 33ha of canopy on the property growing the Envy and Jugala apple varieties and the planned expansion would bring it up to 48ha, while the remaining 13ha of land would be used for supporting infrastructure.
“There is a future [in the apple industry]. The problem is that New Zealand is pretty capital-constrained. We just don’t have a lot of cash,” he said.
“Reinvestment generally depends on bank finance and we all know where interest rates have been. We see that there is a real need over the next couple of years to put equity into our rural communities to redevelop apple orchards, vineyards, all sorts.”
He said there “absolutely would be” new jobs created in addition to the existing ones at the orchard.
“The average modern orchard can end up generating between 1500 and 1800 hours of work per hectare a year and that is just on the orchard let alone packhouses and all that.”
Beehive Demetra was looking into other options for purchases at the moment and while he couldn’t go into detail, he said they were looking outside of Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay for now.
“Regional diversification is really important, as we saw with the cyclone, so we will be looking elsewhere to get a balance, but that is not to say we won’t be back.”
Judco general manager Mark Lewis had no further comment on the sale to add to what Craigmore Sustainables had publically said.
At the time Gisborne District Council’s 2023/24 summer crop survey was released there were 653.3ha planted in apples and pears (grouped by the council due to similar infrastructure) in the Gisborne region.
The crop was the region’s sixth most abundant and the area it covered had steadily increased over the past eight years, with an increase of 467.2ha from the 2014/15 period to 2023/24.
James Pocock joined the Gisborne Herald as chief reporter in 2024 after covering environmental, local government and post-cyclone issues in Hawke’s Bay. He has a keen interest in finding the bigger picture in research and making it more accessible to audiences. He lives near Gisborne. james.pocock@nzme.co.nz.
