It’s only when you get inside Gisborne’s newest kiwifruit orchard that the scale becomes apparent.
Geometric lines of vines disappear into the distance, with the perspective made even more impressive by the dance floor-flat contour.
Carol Franklin hastens to point out she’s nothing special; just a hard-working mum flying solo in her little patch of Opotiki paradise.
But that doesn't diminish the incredible story of how tragedy thrust Carol into an industry she knew little about - and how she's come up trumps.
“My goal has always been to have a totally self-integrated kiwifruit business,” explains Noel Cooper, Wanganui’s largest grower and owner of Cooper Coolpac Ltd. The Cooper’s family-owned business is run by Noel and Sue Cooper and their son Andrew and includes 48 hectares of orchard, as well as a packhouse and coolstores which pack and store all their own fruit.
Leo and Diane Whittle’s orchard out the back of No. 4 Road Te Puke, is a world apart, edged with bright gardens and bordered by native bush. The Whittles looked for a year for the right orchard to buy – and 25 years later, they’re still happily growing Zespri Organic Kiwifruit on their 7ha block on the gully edge.
Bill Stevens has been growing kiwifruit on his family farm in Riwaka, just outside Motueka, since 1977 – “a really long time”– and he has no plans to retire. In true Motueka style, the Stevens grow apples and pears on their farm, bound by the Tasman Bay on one side and the Motueka River on the other.
Katikati grower Sean Carnachan is emphatic when asked why he is still in the kiwifruit industry after 31 years; “I still love it – it’s my dream job”.
His passion and enthusiasm for growing kiwifruit and taking on the challenges inherent in the industry are unmistakable.
The Journal met with Peter and Anne Roberts on the last day of picking on their seven orchards, in front of a tiled fire on a clear May night. The Roberts are stalwarts of the Gisborne kiwifruit industry, growing around 35 hectares of kiwifruit and 25 hectares of grapes, with the help of their son, Simon.
It’s a long way from growing tobacco, maize, groundnuts and winter wheat in the heart of Zimbabwe, to growing kiwifruit on the outskirts of Kerikeri.
But that’s exactly the journey of Derek and Denise van Rooyen and their three children.
"If this is about Psa, I want to be clear I don’t have any magic answer,”
David French says down the line from Auckland. The New Zealand Kiwifruit Journal has called to ask David if he would be happy to feature in the grower profile, and he is very quick to point out he doesn’t have a one-size-fits-all solution.
Braden Hungerford was one of the first growers to face the media when Psa was discovered in New Zealand. Braden had to remove 12 hectares of vines from his orchard in Te Puke at a time when it had just started producing a crop. Two very busy years on and Braden and his family (wife Rachel, and children Josiah, 6, Anika, 4, Luka, 2 and Georgia, 9 months) are determined to find the positives as they focus on the future.
