Fewer seasonal jobs in Nelson

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32838, 11 February 1972, Page 8

Fewer seasonal jobs in Nelson

(From Out Own Reporter) NELSON, February 10. Nelson, for many years a fertile field for the seasonal labour force, is going to prove barren this season for those who have not contracted for positions through their local Labour Department offices.

The tobacco harvest has been under way now for three weeks and execpt m a few cases labour supply has kept up with and even surpassed the demand. It is the same in the orchards. A number of factors have combined this year to lessen the demand for a transient labour force. The Tobacco Growers’ Federation brought 303 Fijians into the Motueka district to form the labour nucleus for the tobacco harvest and this, in itself has cut into numbers required.

A leaf-cut imposed by the manufacturers at the beginning of the planting season has also meant a reduction in the numbers of workers required. Apple packing Mechanisation of apple packing through two big packing co-operatives in Nelson and Richmond has eliminated the need for packers on the orchards of 56 of the 210 growers in the district, and a demand for labour will also have been lessened slightly by the recruitment of 50 girls from Australia flown

to Nelson for the harvest The two co-operatives, each employing about 100 persons, have tapped a new source of labour—the housewife. A lack of markets for the district’s raspberry crop this season has meant a consequent drop in demand for pickers. Raspberry farms

Last season the Nelson office of the Labour Department placed 318 pickers on raspberry farms. This season, with much of last year’s crop still unsold, growers required only 240 pickers through the department. The district officer of the Labour Department (Mr R. V. Hebbend) said today that his office had been able to find jobs for most seasonal workers who had applied at their local Labour Department offices. Those who did not take this step—but arrived in Nelson in the hope of finding work—were not so fortunate.

There were still a few vacancies for tobacco workers, but the number was fewer than at the same time last year, he said.