Pipfruit exporter Enza is running into stiff opposition with a plan for growers to pick up the bill for financial losses from previous years.
Enza, the corporatised former Apple and Pear Marketing Board now controlled by investment companies GPG and FR Partners, will lose its virtual monopoly on export sales when
the industry is deregulated in October. With that deadline looming, it wants its $55 million in accumulated losses fully paid by suppliers this season, in a one-off $4.50-a-carton deduction, or spread in an 82c-a-carton industry levy over the next five years.
Agriculture Minister Jim Sutton has said the Government will consider empowering legislation for the five-year levy only if most industry players support it.
Grower organisations say $4.50 a carton would send many orchardists broke. Motueka Fruit Growers president Graham Smeaton said a Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry survey in his region found only 20 per cent of orchardists were estimated to break even this season as it was.
Mr Smeaton said the legacy debt was the most important issue facing the industry. "It has the ability to cause its demise."
This year's already-low returns could mean some growers will receive next to nothing for lower-grade export fruit.
Enza is 40 per cent owned by GPG and FR Partners.
- NZPA
