Farmers are dumping millions of dollars of fresh produce as worker shortages caused by COVID-19 continue to wreak havoc on Australia’s food supply chain.
Paul Gazolla, owner of Gazolla Farms on the Mornington Peninsula, is ploughing up to 30 per cent of his weekly output of lettuce, celery, broccoli and Asian greens into the ground because he does not have enough staff to pick the produce.
Farmer Paul Gazolla says he doesn’t have enough staff to pick his produce.Credit: Simon Schluter
He said he had reduced his deliveries to Coles, Woolworths and smaller retailers because up to 20 per cent of his staff were sick with COVID-19 or isolating. He is struggling to access rapid antigen tests so employees can safely return to work.
“Most growers are putting some portion of product back into the ground,” he said. “It’s been really bad the past four weeks. Every day is a blur at the moment. I look forward to the day when I can just focus on growing vegetables.”
While consumers are being confronted with empty shelves at the supermarket, farmers are growing the same volume of food but struggling to harvest it due to labour shortages. Shortages of transport, processing and distribution workers are also making it difficult for produce to reach shops.
Victorian Farmers Federation president Emma Germano said the situation was heartbreaking and she knew of one farmer who recently dumped $1 million worth of tomato and cucumber stock because a major supermarket had cancelled an order due to worker shortages.
Credit: Matt Golding
“There’s nothing worse for a farmer who grows something [than] for it to be wasted in the paddock,” she said. “There’s the environmental impact of that, the financial cost of business, it’s just absolutely obscene.”
She said fruit and vegetable growers were being hit the hardest because, unlike livestock farmers, their produce needed to be harvested at a certain time.
Organic fruit grower Nathan Free, who is also the Victorian Farmers Federation’s horticulture president, said he had been left with 22,000 pre-packaged units of stone fruit after Woolworths halted orders due to worker shortages.
He said he would normally send out about 25,000 units, but had moved only 3000 this week. He said he would run out of storage by the end of the week and have to start dumping stock the following week.
“We’ve never experienced anything like this before and we are a fourth-generation farm,” he said. “There’s no issue of supply, but we’re struggling to get food to the consumer.”
A Woolworths spokesman said the supermarket was working with some producers to review their supply volumes, to ensure the right balance of stock reached distribution centres.
“While this is never our first preference, this short-term measure will help us prioritise key lines for our customers,” he said. “We’re currently experiencing delays with stock deliveries to our stores due to the impacts of COVID-19 across the food and grocery supply chain.
Agriculture groups have repeatedly called for food supply chain workers to get priority access to rapid antigen tests, which are in short supply across the country.
Victoria and NSW’s governments have introduced rules that have stopped isolation requirements for essential, asymptomatic workers even if they are a close contact of someone with COVID-19. National cabinet will on Thursday introduce similar federal rules.
Echuca pork producer Tim Kingma, who supplies his meat to butchers, said the easing of isolation rules for food supply workers was useless while there was a shortage of rapid antigen tests.
“I have tried for the past week to buy a single one and I haven’t found one,” he said. “We have staff who may be unnecessarily isolating at home because they can’t get a RAT.”
Mr Kingma said he had been unable to move 20 per cent of his stock this week – 100 pigs – due to worker shortages in the boning room. He will be able to look after these pigs for up to two weeks, but he worries what will happen to the animals if worker shortages continue beyond this.
“Pigs put on a kilogram a day,” he said. “There may not be a buyer that can deal with them. They would be too big after this time.”
A Coles spokeswoman said the retailer was working closely with fresh produce suppliers who were facing disruptions and in some cases “simplifying the range we accept from them, at their request. We also know many of our customers are currently staying home and cooking their own meals, which is putting additional strain on the supply chain as many families would usually be enjoying the school holiday break, socialising and going out to eat.”
The supermarket said the changes to isolation requirements for close contacts would allow it to deliver more food and essentials to customers.
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