Yarra Valley berry farmer Peter Chapman: Healthy crop but labour woes

Yarra Valley berry farmer Peter Chapman’s raspberries were on point on this year, but finding workers to pick the fruit was another thing.

Peter Chapman among the raspberries on his Wandin East farm. Picture: Zoe Phillips

PETER Chapman’s raspberry season drew to a close this week but his cherries are in full-swing.

The fourth generation Yarra Valley farmer grows raspberries, cherries, blueberries, bay berries and red currants in Wandin East.

He said while the season produced healthy berry crops, a shortage of backpackers made it difficult to get the fruit picked in time.

“There were none (backpackers) around this year, so we found contractors but we had to drop a few paddocks off. We lost a bit of fruit but got most picked. The labour shortage was certainly a massive problem,” Mr Chapman said.

They’re now frantically picking cherries to sell through their shed door. He said rain about two weeks ago wiped off about half of the crop. What’s left he said was selling for between $16/kg and $6/kg depending on the quality of the fruit.

Compared to last year, sales were down but he said not considerably.

The extended Chapman family have been farming in the area for 140 years across 11 farms. It’s now down to four and the family run separate businesses, mostly growing berries.

Peter is among a handful trialling commercial-scale production of the Chinese bayberry. As a grower with YV Fresh, a co-operative representing 15 growers mostly in the Yarra Valley and with exclusive rights to the new berry variety, he is in the throes of attempting to graft the fruit to boost production levels.

Propagation has proven difficult but work is underway next year to trial new grafting techniques.

The largest market for the berry will be export to China, but it is also predicted to be very popular domestically once Australia’s get a taste of its slightly citrusy flavour that’s described as being between a raspberry and a blackberry.

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