Millions of tulip bulbs and more than 75 jobs may be on the line unless Southland’s bulb growers can export their crops during the Covid-19 lockdown. Bulb grower Triflor, and three other Southland growing companies, collectively have about 150 million bulbs, with an export value of more than $35 million in storage ready to be exported, but they are not deemed to be an essential business because they are not a food producer. Triflor operations manager Rudi Verplancke said he had been dealing with the Ministry for Primary Industries to find out if the bulbs could be exported. "It is like banging your head against the wall really. MPI said we are not an essential business but they don’t understand the situation we are in. If we cannot export the bulbs, they will all have to be destroyed." READ MORE: * Bumper tulip season in the south * Hamilton’s annual tulip festival displaying Dutch heritage to all cultures * Tulip crops destroyed by picky hands While the companies were crop farmers, they were not food producers and therefore not deemed essential, he said. "We don’t know where we are and where we stand. We can’t do anything." Triflor New Zealand tulip operational manager Rudi Verplancke with some of the tulip bulbs that can not be exported Triflor employed 10 seasonal workers at the moment. "Across the industry in Southland at the moment I would think it is probably 75 full time equivalent jobs." As an industry it appreciated the difficulty in negotiating the Covid-19 crisis. "It is the lack of response from MPI what is the most frustrating, not knowing when the status quo will end and we can ship our product, which can be done by each company with staff from one bubble." Flower bulbs are a perishable product with a restricted shelf life, so exporting them is essential. A lack of flights to northern hemisphere markets because of the Covid-19 crisis was not an issue for the industry, Verplancke said. The first of the bulbs should be exported to North America in the next week, and the […]
Travis Rigby is the publisher of SuperFloral, the news source for the mass-market floral industry. He leads its website and weekly newsletter, covering what matters to growers, breeders, supermarket floral buyers and category managers. Travis studied journalism at the University of Utah, founded and led PosterGarden.com for 27 years, and is president of FlowerBox.com.
