Seasonal Solutions employed 600 Vanuatuans on Central Otago amd Marlborough orchards and vineyards during the past year and manager Craig Howard was told recently that made the co-operative a major employer in Vanuatu.
"I was over there last week and was told that we were probably the second-biggest employer of Vanuatuans, second only to the Government, which is the single-biggest employer of Vanuatuan people."
Mr Howard, who is based in Alexandra, returned last week from a recruitment drive in Vanuatu. He said Seasonal Solutions employed about 230 seasonal workers from that country on vineyards and orchards in Central Otago and Queenstown for about 10 months of the year, starting in October. The last group of Vanuatuans returned home last week.
A further 350 were employed in Marlborough, some to prune grapes in winter and another group to thin and harvest the crop in summer and autumn.
They were all employed through the Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme, which allows workers to be recruited from certain Pacific Island countries to solve labour shortages in New Zealand.
Vanuatu has a population of 225,000. The wages earned by the seasonal workers who travelled to this country would make a major contribution to Vanuatu's economy, Mr Howard said.
The wages bill for those 600 people was $9 million. He said probably two-thirds of that total was spent on food, rent and tax. Of the remaining $3 million, Mr Howard estimated roughly half would be spent on other goods in this country, with about $1.5 million being taken back to Vanuatu.
The majority of the workers wanted to come back for the next season, he said.
SEASONAL SOLUTIONS
• Employment initiative set up in 2004.
• Aims to address seasonal work problems in Central Otago.
• Now extended to cover Central Otago and Marlborough.
• Became co-operative in 2006, owned by orchardists and grape growers.
• Placed about 1800 people - 1200 New Zealanders and 600 Vanuatuans - in seasonal jobs in past year.
