\u201cThe Government is committing $50,000 for the first stage of a feasibility study to assess what is required for a grower-led purchase of the site to be commercially viable,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n
McClay said he and government officials had met with representatives in the Bay and its mayors, to gather more information.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know this is a difficult time for the more than 100 Hawke\u2019s Bay growers impacted by the site\u2019s closure and the rural communities they belong to.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve asked my officials to remain in close contact with growers and to provide their expertise where required.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the closure tipped for late January 2027, a company representative told RNZ this week it was unable to pause the closure, as the commercial sale process of the site was already underway.<\/p>\n
The pause was requested by Hawke\u2019s Bay mayors Wendy Schollum for the Hastings District and Will Foley of Central Hawke\u2019s Bay.<\/p>\n
Hastings District Mayor Wendy Schollum and Central Hawke’s Bay Mayor Will Foley asked for the closure of the factory to be paused. Photo \/ RNZ<\/p>\n
In a letter to growers in March, McCain ANZ agriculture director Josh Opas said it would honour all existing contractual commitments through the current season with production continuing at Hastings, as planned, but the decision would affect future growing seasons.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe closure follows a review of our Hastings operations, which considered a range of options to strengthen the long-term position of the site,\u201d he said in the letter.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite meaningful effort, we were unable to identify a sustainable pathway under the current model.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a result, we will transition to sourcing vegetable products through trusted supply partners within our broader network.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tukituki MP Catherine Wedd said the government had committed support to assess if the plant was commercially viable and what was required for a grower-led purchase of the site. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe hope our getting behind growers right here, right now, gets them in a position to make an offer and shows our commitment to farmers and growers,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Also in March, competing vegetable processor Heinz Wattie\u2019s confirmed it too would close a number of processing and packing sites nationwide.<\/p>\n
Many in the regional rural sector expected flow-on effects from the closures, ranging from vegetable and seed growing to rural contracting and processing.<\/p>\n
– RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe Government is committing $50,000 for the first stage of a feasibility study to assess what is required…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":451652,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[42344,1561,1040,13741,2082,266,28450,19392,1976,76369,183707,28205,111,43,139,69,28206,26592],"class_list":["post-451651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-42344","tag-bay","tag-bid","tag-factory","tag-for","tag-government","tag-groups","tag-grower","tag-hawkes","tag-invests","tag-mccain","tag-monique","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-steele","tag-takeover"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451651","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=451651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}