Fruit picking: Sharing the secret to success

Success as a fruit picker can be challenging – unless you’ve got someone like Sidney Aspland to show you the tips and tricks.

Sidney Aspland has been training young people in fruit picking. Picture: Zoe Phillips

Successful fruit picking, Sidney Aspland reckons, is a 50-50 game.

The first 50 is physical: the obvious strength, energy and stamina it takes to climb the ladders, fill the bags, again and again. The rest? It’s all in the mind – and that’s the part many don’t expect to trip them up.

“The mental side is being able to stay there, in the paddock, it’s hot, it’s hard work, all day long and put the time in,” Mr Aspland says. “But if they get past those first few days, they get involved and hooked in the game.”

Mr Aspland should know. The Shepparton local has 46 years’ experience as a fruit picker, and this past season he’s been sharing his knowledge with newcomers to the industry as part of the PickShepp campaign.

The program, run by Fruit Growers Victoria and City of Greater Shepparton for a two-year trial, aims to hire more Australians to fill the harvest jobs left vacant due to the ongoing worker shortage.

The program attracted 1500 registrations of interest in this first year. Mr Aspland ran infield inductions for workers, many from Melbourne, in a bid to set them up to be able to fill the most bins possible and earn a decent wage – one of the biggest hurdles in retaining workers.

“The first year I did it, I hated it,” Mr Aspland concedes. “I picked three bins a day … then it was five, then nine, then 14, so you do have to put the time in.

“We had quite a few this year who were picking five, six, eight bins a day by the end.”

At $40 a bin, it can be a good earner – but less so if you’re stuck on two bins.

This is where Mr Aspland says the Victorian Government’s sign-on bonus – which pays workers $810 for completing 10 days work – has helped bridge the gap in the early days of learning to pick.

The PickShepp program is looking to expand into other parts of the Goulburn Valley next season.