Backpacker earned $400 a day fruit picking

[Guest The Pom Queen]

Recent revelations from a backpacker picker have questioned the legality of some contract labour operators.

In the Buzzfeed epilogue Joshua Fox describes his blackbird treatment at the hands of unscrupulous middlemen who supply labour to farmers.

Regardless of this man’s apparent work eithic, the reader can’t help feel moved by his descriptions of working for free on a Woolgoolga blueberry farm or pruning apple trees until his hands bled in Batlow. Neither did they sit well with the horticultural industry.

A coastal blueberry producer who wished to remain anonymous said he had issues with shady contractors not doing the right thing. Other growers did too. “It’s a common problem,” he said.

“There have been cases where producers pay the contractor correctly and they pass on to their workers just $10-$12/hr.

“There are scam operators who set up and suddenly disappear,” he said.

The Fair Work Ombudsman is currently addressing this issue.

“Preventing the deliberate exploitation of young people and visa holders who work in low-skilled positions is a priority,” said a spokesman.

“The agriculture industry accounted for three per cent of the disputes the Fair Work Ombudsman helped to resolve in 2016-17, but ten per cent of the Agency’s enforcement outcomes involved employers in this sector.”

 

Farmer’s risk

Meanwhile, the farmer paying labour to pick blueberries forks out two thirds of the return as labour costs. With the market flush with product poorly picked fruit is easily knocked down in price. During October trays of blueberries sold for as low as $1 when they cost the producer $15. At the same time so much rain after so little all winter delivered difficult fungal challenges.

The role of the hand picker in getting soft, plump fruit into the punnet is now critical as ever. There is little slack given to employees who chat, giggle and throw berries at each other.

Never-the-less farmers continue to pay the slow workers. Labour by law demands $22.86/hr and 15 per cent more for piece rate plus super and payroll tax.

Workers are paid by the bucket but to work out the piece rate an average is selected from the gang of workers, not just the guns.

“We might have to put a call into a labour contractor during busy periods and suddenly we have 80 per cent inexperienced workers,” the grower said. “It’s things like this that can make it very hard for the producer.”

These days people of cultural background are typically the hardest workers in the field particularly Asians who have an ability and fitness to pick berries, even when temperatures climb above 40 degrees.

This grower’s hardest working backpackers take home $400/day, with the average earning between $180-$200. When it comes to who’s hardest, the grower says Europeans and most Australians fail to make top 10.

“On a 40 degree day those guys are at the beach,” he said.

Hands on management

At Mr Zanette’s orchard, near Lismore, backpacker or grey nomad labour is the only way to get fruit picked.

“Many young generation Australians are not likely to make the grade except for those coming from a farming background,” he said.

Asian backpackers were by far and away the best, although his two favourite were a young Belgian couple who worked and lived on his property, sleeping in their van.

“She was the best paid picker I’ve ever had and after day two she was teaching others,” he said. “Her partner’s work ethic was as good as hers. He worked hard and both were thoughtful, kind and willing to help with all chores. Let me tell you we all had tears in our eyes when they moved on.”

Mr Zanette said a hands-on approach to managing labour was essential for a small farmer’s success.

“I usually find my workforce through Harvest Trail, but I scrutinise them myself.

“I’ve never underpaid their hourly rate - I don’t pay by piece work - but I’ve warned some of them that if they don’t perform I will ask them to leave. We expect a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay.”

“Some come for a working holiday and get on with the job, others just want enough money to party hard at night and they come back the next day half stoned or still asleep. Generally cashed-up Europeans are here for the fun. Asians, with the exception of some of the wealthy ones, are more accepting of the work. They might be here for a holiday but they also come to earn money - and send some of it back home.

“Without the dependable backpackers and the older grey nomads we simply wouldn’t get the job done. But a complaint I hear across all industries is that, generally speaking, they can’t get people to work.”

Doing the heavy lifting

There still remains the issue of pickers who are victims of the system.

This reporter spoke to a young Italian worker now serving hamburgers near an American airbase at Aviano north of Venice. He had spent a year downunder, earning up to $400/day harvesting watermelons in Bundaberg. To make that sort of money before the sun went down he had to dead-lift 17,000 kilos of the volleyball sized fruit.

Another job picking onions earned him $2/hr and he left before the day finished, willing to take the loss just to get out of there.

“My contractor only hired Italians and all we spoke was Italian,” he recalled. “It was like I wasn’t even in Australia.”

Would he go back? Not likely. “I’ve got a better deal here,” he said.

https://www.theland.com.au/story/5092384/whos-picking-on-our-harvest/?cs=4943

[Tootsie]

Yes fruit picking is a hard job for low pay.

My Australian husband did it a few times in his uni holiday breaks.

Said it was the hardest he had ever worked - for the least amount of money

In scorching sun, in snake infested fields, for 12 hours shifts.

He was picking grapes and oranges.

But it can be fun if you choose the right fruit...........a good rite of passage for many backpackers (and Australian uni students)

A friend of mine was backpacking in New Zealand and got a job on a Kiwi farm. Sounded great. She didn't do any picking. Worked in an air-conditioned shed, packing and sticking those little labels on fruit. Good breaks, all meals supplied, fair good pay and excellent group of local New Zealanders and backpackers working together. Bosses were great by all accounts..

Then again, I have also heard some slave labour horrific rip-off type dangerous working conditions.

Just like anything in life - you get the good and the bad