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As kūmara growers in Kaipara continue to count the cost of this year’s weather-related crop devastation, a NZ snack manufacturer has had to reach across the Tasman for Australian sweet potatoes as a temporary substitute for its kūmara-flavoured crisps.
Last week, red kūmara were selling for an eye-watering $14 a kilo at the three big supermarkets, and orange kūmara for $11-12 a kilo, the consequence of a crop ruined by Cyclone Gabrielle.
Over on the snack aisle, packs of Proper Crisps’ kūmara crisps, bearing a stamp certifying “100 per cent NZ genuine Kaipara-grown kūmara”, have given way to packs of a sweet potato product, “crafted in the Yarra Valley”.
Up to 80 per cent of the country’s kūmara crop was destroyed as a result of the cyclone and its aftermath. Almost all is grown in Kaipara.
“In our 50 years of harvesting kūmara, this year’s weather is by far the biggest challenge we’ve faced,” said Kaipara Kūmara managing director Anthony Blundell, who has been supplying the mineral rich orange, gold and red tubers to Proper Crisps for the past nine years.
“Since the floods, we’ve been left with 1500 tonnes of kūmara compared to our usual 8000 tonnes.”
Nelson-based Proper Crisps says it will return to sourcing kūmara from Kaipara when the crop returns next season.
Kūmara growers usually use a small percentage of their annual crop for seed for the following season, but the significant crop losses caused by Cyclone Gabrielle – which came after an already wetter-than-usual planting season – made it difficult for them to get enough seed stock from their own farms.
Earlier this year, the Ministry for Primary Industries announced it was making available a contingency fund of almost $270,000 to enable growers in Kaipara to buy seed stock, to support the industry’s recovery.
The money came from a $4 million fund set aside by the government to help rural communities with immediate post-cyclone recovery needs. It was distributed through the Northern Wairoa Vegetable Growers Association and Vegetables New Zealand.
The association’s Warwick Simpson told the paper last week the seed contingency scheme was drawing to a close. Six growers in the area had received seed kūmara through the project, with some 80 field bins of kūmara distributed, he said. A seventh grower, who had been eligible for assistance, decided not to grow kūmara this season because of financial constraints.
Simpson said growers were in the early stages of the planting season, with slips that were produced from the seed kūmara in seedbeds being transplanted out in the paddocks.
“The saturated soil and recent wet weather are creating challenges,” he said. Planting usually continues until the end of December, with harvest expected at the end of the summer.
