Hastings District Council will also be working with Foodeast Haumako (the regional food, beverage and agritech hub) to bring together food producers, manufacturers and supply chain businesses from across the region.<\/p>\n
Schollum said this would help get a clearer picture of the pressures facing the sector, to test what messages it needed to take to the Government and to identify where collective regional action was needed.<\/p>\n
\u201cUndoubtedly, rising costs across the supply chain, from growing to transport to processing, are part of the picture.<\/p>\n
\u201cEnergy costs are likely to be a significant contributor, but we also need to understand the broader competitiveness pressures our regional industries are facing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Foley said the sudden closure was a complete shock and had come at a time when clouds of uncertainty hung over the community.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have about 9000 hectares of crops, worth millions of dollars to our local economy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen there\u2019s the rest of the Hawke\u2019s Bay production, with a chain of people affected, from contractors to truck drivers and factory workers. It will be monumental.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to protect Hawke\u2019s Bay\u2019s food basket by enabling businesses to start having conversations earlier.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to be proactive and get to the bottom of the concerns impacting our businesses. As a result of this closure, our producers will need to diversify. What are their options?\u201d<\/p>\n
Schollum said there should be a much stronger focus, both regionally and nationally, on ensuring businesses in regions such as Hawke\u2019s Bay could remain viable in the face of cost pressures.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe cannot afford to accept this as inevitable.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we don\u2019t get this right, we risk hollowing out the very industries that underpin our economy and provide jobs for our people.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe urgently need to identify how we can support affordable, reliable energy, strengthen the competitiveness of our food and fibre sector, and build a diverse local economy that is resilient over the long term.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a council, we will stand alongside those affected and push hard for support where it is needed and continue advocating for our region in national conversations about energy, economic resilience, and the changes needed to protect jobs and keep industry in our region.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur district is built on the strength of our growers, our workforce, and our supply chains. Losing pieces of that network is not just an economic issue \u2013 it goes to the heart of our community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Foley said the region needed to plan for resilience to protect it from external shocks and forces that were really hurting it.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe opportunity is to address this now so we are much better placed for the future.\u201d <\/p>\n
McCain\u2019s New Zealand operation has made losses for three of its past five financial years.<\/p>\n
The company said it made the closure decision after a strategic review of its Hastings operation, and the move reflected a shift in how it would supply vegetables in Australia and New Zealand.<\/p>\n
LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hastings District Council will also be working with Foodeast Haumako (the regional food, beverage and agritech hub) to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":348105,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[30687,62641,806,85987,1561,138,87228,17163,3088,100174,22051,88857,564,5194,1976,47532,17250,183707,9862,111,139,69,1118,14725,70675,20155,22309,7192,10534,7538,1521,1361,223,1961,61,3270,6436,1533],"class_list":["post-348104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-accept","tag-afford","tag-as","tag-basket","tag-bay","tag-business","tag-cannot","tag-closure","tag-commercial","tag-discuss","tag-factories","tag-factors","tag-food","tag-hastings","tag-hawkes","tag-inevitable","tag-mayors","tag-mccain","tag-meet","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-options","tag-processing","tag-representatives","tag-retain","tag-risk","tag-see","tag-shutdown","tag-strategic","tag-that","tag-the","tag-this","tag-to","tag-we","tag-well","tag-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=348104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348104\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/348105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=348104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=348104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=348104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}