Zespri is a thriving co-operative of growers in New Zealand who also work with growers in other parts of the world to fulfil our mission of providing fresh, full-flavoured, nutritious kiwifruit all year round.
Zespri kiwifruit grows in carefully selected orchards under ideal conditions: fertile, moist and slightly acidic soil, a sunny climate and not too much wind.
Zespri is owned and managed co-operatively by thousands of New Zealand growers. Our growers earn a living whilst making a contribution to their local economy as well as playing a role in people’s diet globally, by providing a healthy, nutritious fruit.
A natural aptitude, a green thumb, a deep passion for fabulous fruit, there are many things our growers have in common but the overriding one is that they love what they do.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Jeff and Shirley Roderick grow Organic Green and Organic SunGold kiwifruit at their Te Puke (pronounced teh-pook-eh) orchard in the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand. They are industry leaders in organic orchard practices, believing that feeding the soil is vital for delicious health-giving fruit.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Alan and Viv Geck have grown kiwifruit for 15 years and grow 3 hectares of Zespri Organic Green and 1 hectare of Organic SunGold kiwifruit.
Their orchard is just outside of Cambridge, a town in the Waikato Region of the North Island of New Zealand. Lake Karapiro, recognised as one of the premium rowing lakes in the world, is close by, producing several world rowing champions, notably Rob Waddell and Mahé Drysdale.
In addition to growing kiwifruit, Allen and Viv were dairy farmers for 40 years with a 110-strong Jersey herd, including a champion Jersey bull. They sold the herd in 2014 to focus on growing Zespri kiwifruit.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Terry and Mary Richards are long-time kiwifruit orchardists. They have been growing kiwifruit since 1981. Growing such a healthy fruit for people to enjoy is important to them. They grow Zespri Green, Sweet Green and SunGold kiwifruit on their orchard in Paengaroa, which is a largely rural settlement just outside of Te Puke.
NEW ZEALAND
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NEW ZEALAND
Based in Te Puke, Dennis and Debbie Robinson are some of New Zealand’s many dairy farmers who have converted farmland to a commercial kiwifruit orchard. They have been growing Zespri Green kiwifruit for over 30 years and Zespri Organic Green kiwifruit for over 10 years. They strive to protect and nurture the environment that provides shelter and a livelihood for their family.
When not working, Dennis and Debbie enjoy watching the sun set over their orchard from their front garden and listening to the sounds of native birds. They also like travelling to different countries and seeing people enjoy their kiwifruit.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Dave and Julie Smith’s home is on their orchard in Te Puke, where they grow Zespri Green and SunGold kiwifruit.
Both Dave and Julie have been heavily involved with the kiwifruit industry for over 30 years. They are innovative growers and take a lot of care to get the balance of organic matter in the soils right. Julie describes the soil as the key to healthy vines, good sized kiwifruit, greater orchard yields and better tasting fruit packed full of nutrients and vitamins.
Dave and Julie come from farming backgrounds and are working to establish a farming museum on their orchard to preserve history in this increasingly fast-paced world and to ensure that future generations can see and understand the effort that was put into farming practices.
Based in the Bay of Plenty, Te Puke is the Kiwifruit Capital of the World with roughly 75 percent of Zespri kiwifruit coming from there. It is literally surrounded by orchards.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Brian Carlyle grows 3.5 hectares of Zespri Organic Green kiwifruit and manages his parents’ 12 hectares of orchards. Located in the Tauranga region, Brian’s orchard is not far from the Port of Tauranga, which is New Zealand’s largest export port in terms of cargo volume. It is also just a 15-minute drive from one of New Zealand’s most popular beach towns, Mount Maunganui.
Brian grew up on his parents’ kiwifruit orchard and started helping them with it as a child at school holidays and weekends. He bought his own small orchard when he was 23 and now owns two and leases one. Brian enjoys growing Zespri kiwifruit and is always looking for new ways to improve the fruit he grows and sends to customers.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
It was 1978 when Sandi Clink’s parents bought land in Katikati, in New Zealand’s Bay of Plenty, to develop into a kiwifruit orchard; meaning Sandi was an eager 11-year-old when her life in kiwis began. Going on to purchase a Hayward (the green variety of kiwifruit) block in 1992, which she still owns today, made her one of the first female growers to have an orchard of her own. Her father, at 80, is still a working orchardist. He’s still caring for the kiwis and doing most of the orchard management; still driving the forklift and still loading trucks. It’s with admiration Sandi says odds are she’ll be doing the same.
But beyond the family connection, and her love of the outdoors and working the land, Sandi lives and breathes growing kiwis because it gives her a lifestyle that allows her to make choices. The choice of how to spend her days means she can work the job around her family. As a busy mum, her lifestyle has been able to focus around her kids – from picking them up after school, to coaching sports teams and cheering them on from the sidelines.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Some of the kiwifruit vines Tammy and Cameron Hill own and look after are more than 30 years old. With proper care and a lot of love, they will continue to bear fruit, and that’s an exciting prospect: “It’s all about taking care of them.”
For this busy couple of second-generation kiwi growers, sustainability is more than just a buzzword. The environment has always been a factor; but now there is more awareness, regulation and care in an industry pushing its boundaries to produce the best fruit it can. There’s a family element too – Tammy’s parents were some of the first growers in the region in the 1960s, and she and Cameron would love to be able to pass the mantle on to their two young daughters one day.
Over the 12 years the Hills have had their farm, they see technological changes all the time.
NEW ZEALAND
NEW ZEALAND
Gill and Bruce Cameron have been married 35 years as of June 2017, and they’re still on the kiwifruit farm they moved to as newly-weds. Back then Bruce’s parents were at the helm of the farm, and today they still live on the property, having recently celebrated 60 years of marriage. Bruce’s grandmother lived there until the age of 96, and his eldest daughter, Anna, with her husband and children, round off four generations in once place. That’s a lot of kiwis.
The farm in the Eastern Bay of Plenty, on the northern coast of New Zealand’s North Island, has always been a mixed lot, and the diversity in agriculture has kept things interesting and fruitful – when one crop does well, it helps cover for others that might have had a tougher season. It’s all part of working the land. With dairy grazers and beef sitting nicely alongside the business of growing kiwifruit, and four generations on the farm, they couldn’t be happier to be living and working surrounded by family.
As peaceful as a kiwifruit orchard might appear, there’s never a dull moment in our process of working towards the perfect fruit.
The vines lay dormant but this is the time where our pruners get busy. They artfully remove the previous season’s fruiting canes while selecting new canes which will form the foundations of the new crop.
It is an exciting moment when the first flower buds burst to life each Spring. The vines have started the first step in making fruit and the bees then move between the flowers pollinating them in the process. Which will transform the flowers into small berries.
This is the time of year that you can almost hear the vines and fruit growing in the orchard. It is so vigorous that the canopy often has to be pruned and the kiwifruit crop itself thinned to optimise fruit size.
The summer heat passes and as the days and nights cool the promise of harvest hangs in the air. A sample is taken from every orchard to assess the optimum moment for harvest. And then suddenly, thanks to the swift and sure hands of our pickers, the kiwifruit are picked, carefully packed and whisked to the world.
