Leading Food and Beverages company, T&G Global, in a bid to enlarge its New Zealand Apple business, will initiate a recruitment program of 150 permanent staff members. Craig Betty, T&G Global’s director of operations asserted that the creation of new roles in the company has been done to meet the increasing global demand. New roles have been created to help T&G achieve future growth objectives and provide opportunities to people to build their skills and capabilities within the company’s operations. Retention of existing talent is also a prerogative. Advertisements of new roles are being run internally amongst T&G’s casual and contracted seasonal workforce, and externally in key apple-growing regions. 

T&G is focused on growing their premium Envy and Jazz apple brands to meet worldwide demand and recruitment of a talented, passionate, and supportive team is essential to accomplish the vision. Betty also mentioned that the corona crisis was very challenging as it became difficult to recruit skilled people in the face of travel bans and social distancing norms. The problem was worsened by the reduced number of Recognized Seasonal Employer (RSE) team members. 

The new employees will be seen climbing up the ladder through harvest and post-harvest roles and developing a comprehensive knowledge about the operational and growing processes including advancing T&G’s 2D orchards, to support the efficient use of automation and robotics in the future.

Recruitment of skilled team members is very necessary to increase T&G’s productivity by optimizing supply chains and speeding up the operational processes. New roles will be critical at spearheading the operation at the peak season of apples while reliance on seasonal staff will be of utmost significance in the harvest season.

Given the context, NZ PM Jacinda Ardern recently announced one way, quarantine free travel for workers from Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu to aid in horticultural activities.