Whakatu ‘survival’ report

Press, 1 July 1986, Page 26

Whakatu ‘survival’ report

PA Hastings The Hawke’s Bay Farmers Meat Company wants big changes to production methods at its Whakatu freezing works to ensure the plant’s survival. The management has issued a 37-page report which pinpoints inefficient practices, anomalies in wage and other payments, wastage and costly production errors. It said that if workers and management cannot hammer out some agreement to improve efficiency, the plant could become “a dinosaur” and the livelihoods of its workers would be at stake. The report said Whakatu’s costs were too high, its products °«n defective and itsi: enfciency below par 9 "Our throughput is fall-

ing and our livelihood is at stake,” it said. Whakatu is the largest plant of its kind in New Zealand and is capable of processing one-sixteenth of the national export sheep, lamb and beef kill. The plant holds the national annual kill record for sheep and lambs. It processed 2,941,398 last season. The company predicts its kill this season will be down by 500,000, and says that if the trend, of farmers, cutting back stock numbers continues and Whakatu cannot attract enough stock "economic disaster” could be around the corner. “If the national export kill falls to 30 million, Whakatu’s share will not reach two million, which ' is no more than the average kill achieved at

Whakatu throughout the 19705.” For a plant with a six chain annual capacity of almost three million to fall to that level, which can be achieved on only four chains, would be economic disaster for everybody. involved, the report said. The Hawke’s Bay Farmers Meat Company’s ownership recently changed with the Wattie Industries, Ltd, take-over. Waitaki International also has a stake in it Copies of the report have been circulated to foremen at Whakatu, and sources there said the document will eventually be made available to all company employees. Quality of production filledifenother chapter in - the rejibrt which said that in a seven-month period

between this year and last, the company settled claims in excess of $57,000 for quality deficiencies because of operator faults at Whakatu. Another proposal listed was to begin immediate discussions to lift both mutton, lamb and beef tallies. These would take

effect next season. The document said a shift work proposal for the lamb cutting room is being thwarted because of union refusals to work for less than rates being paid at Wairoa. It proposed that the industry new technology agreement, hammered out in marathon sessions between management and union representatives earlier this year, should be adopted as the agreed procedure for the introduction of new technology-