Huanui Orchards

Huanui Orchards, seven kilometres from Whangarei, is the sole survivor of the region’s once thriving pip and stonefruit industry. The 30 hectare orchard is owned and managed by Hanley Hutchinson on land settled by his family in 1873. A wide range of fruits are grown here for export, sale on the domestic market and at the orchard shop which opened in 1976. Next door is a packhouse, leased to Bay of Plenty-based EastPack Ltd, New Zealand’s largest grower-owned post-harvest kiwifruit supplier.

The range and choice of fruits grown at Huanui has changed over the years but the philosophy remains the same. You need to put the work in to reap the rewards, and some things are more rewarding than others.

In the early 1900s, Whangarei was a significant pip and stonefruit growing region but by the 1960s, only two growers remained as orchards became concentrated in areas with less rain and cool winters.

Transport to Auckland was initially by coastal steamer until the railway was built in 1923. There was no all-weather road until 1934. Rail had a statutory monopoly until the transport industry was deregulated in 1984.

When Hanley left school, apples were sold to the New Zealand Apple and Pear Marketing Board or seasonally at the orchard gate and prices were strongly influenced by board marketing policy. The board’s selling monopoly was removed in 2001, exposing the industry to the open market.

The Whangarei district now has numerous growers of kiwifruit, avocados, tamarillos, persimmons and other fruit.

Hanley is constantly adapting the mix of fruit he grows to meet export and domestic demand and cater to the taste of loyal orchard store customers. Kiwifruit are the main income earner and area under kiwiwfruit is gradually increasing. Recently he removed some avocado trees and put in drainage, making way for more kiwifruit. “I couldn’t grow just one crop,” Hanley says. “To enjoy life, I have to have variety. There’s talk today about people having several occupations in their life. Well, I’ve done that within this business.”

Apples are the second most significant fruit including traditional varieties Lord Nelson and Ballarat, especially suited to cooking, and many more modern varieties best eaten fresh.  Citrus fruits grown include five varieties of sweet orange, three different mandarins, grapefruit, lemons and lemonades, seldom seen in commercial orchards. Oranges and a few apples are sold through wholesalers and at the shop.

Driven by curiosity, Hanley and now retired staff member Rod Whatmough have experimented with unusual fruits including casimiroa from Mexico and cherimoya from the Andes. These have wonderful tropical flavours but quickly fall on the ground and rot if not picked on time. His latest experiment is Yang Mei from China, also known as Bayberry.

A bachelor, Hanley works from dark until dark in the winter and much of the summer, taking only half a day off on Sundays. He makes the odd overseas trip to follow up on horticultural and other interests.

Gate sales through the shop have been vital to the business, he says. The growing and retail arms are run as separate departments, with production often making a loss but retail turning a profit.

Profitability took a dive when the apple industry was deregulated but thenrecovered when post-harvest facilities (bins, controlled atmosphere cool-storage and the retail shop) were built. After the “apple fiasco”, the kiwifruit industry was starting to recover and contract packing helped with cashflow.

Apples remain the bread and butter of the business with many regular customers coming in to the shop to buy varieties no longer stocked by mainstream retailers.

Huanui Orchards employs about 20 staff but most weeks about 30 turn up to work including school-students and other part-timers. Seven permanent employees work at the shop, open seven days a week from 7am until 6pm.

The kiwifruit, citrus and apples plus stonefruit branches of the business are separately managed and a fulltime driver is charged with cartage and other tasks including mulching, mowing and weed-spraying. Hanley keeps an overview and does most maintenance. In this warm wet climate, a constant eye must be kept out for pests and diseases and timely control is essential, he says. Regular spray schedules kept on top of infections such as black spot in pipfruit and brown rot in stonefruit.

Alongside the shop is a packhouse, built by Hanley but now leased to Bay of Plenty co-operative Eastpack, for the packing of mostly kiwifruit to Zespri requirements.

Asked the success to his long-standing business, Mr Hutchinson says, “I try to be nice to everyone and constantly adapt”.  He counts himself lucky to have had a good start in life, taking on mortgage-free land from his parents which provided a base for further expansion. There are no succession plans with Hanley saying he enjoys keeping fit and busy running the business and gets great satisfaction from using his hands.