Primary sector well placed for staff in coming year

While job seekers in cities face some of the toughest conditions in years, employment levels in the primary sector are back to near normal after a chaotic few years dominated by severe worker shortages.

With calving underway across the North Island in the dairy industry, staffing levels have become more stable and the industry is in a much better position than it was during the peak of covid, DairyNZ people lead Jane Muir said.

As of late July there were around 280 roles being offered on FarmSource, ranging from farm assistant through to sharemilker.

“That’s well down on what it was – that’s four times less.”

The peak in 2021 saw widespread job shortages and huge numbers of roles advertised in the industry.

While the market has tightened, Muir said there is still a place for people with the right skills and attitude within the dairy industry and who want to make it a career.

“There are always roles available, we’re a people-dependent industry and there’s always a level of turnover in any sector.”

Farmers and the sector have worked hard to make dairy jobs more appealing in terms of wages, housing, rostering and other conditions and one of the reasons there has been a fall in job numbers is higher levels of staff retention.

“We’re holding onto our people better, we have better retention than we used to have. The number of people who are staying in the sector and working on farm longer and the number of people who are staying in individual farming businesses – both of those trends are very positive for dairy.”

The higher retention rates also mean fewer opportunities for new entrants. That being said, like any sector there will always be a degree of turnover, she said.

Muir questioned whether the tough job market has given people pause before considering changing jobs.

“I’m sure that’s not unique to dairy. If you have a good job it might be a tougher time to move not knowing where you would go next.”

In the contracting industry, RCNZ chief executive Andrew Olsen said they are still waiting to hear from the government about a possible multi-year multi-return visa being created for those who hire farm machinery drivers from the northern hemisphere.

For the new season, all indications are that there will be around 450-500 overseas workers arriving in the country in late September to work for around nine months, which is around the typical level of staffing for that industry.

Federated Farmers employment spokesperson Karl Dean said there have been very few people contacting their organisation complaining about labour shortages, describing it as an “average” year.

This there will always be some farmers who have issues, but so far there have been no major issues, he said.

“But there will be a lot of visas that need to be renewed in the next six to 12 months.”

Farmers are still trying to run systems that are as lean as possible rather than take on new staff, even though commodity prices are high, he said.

“Sheep and beef farmers are a prime example here. They might get a high price for six months, but you don’t know how long those prices are going to stay up for. Dairy is much the same – you don’t know how long those high payouts will continue.”

When those prices do fall, farmers do not want to be burned by the costs of that extra labour unit, he said.

Dean said he is surprised there is not more interest from city-based people for some of the jobs being advertised, given how tough the job market is.

On his own farm 20 minutes from Christchurch, he recently was looking for someone for a six-month role and had local one person who read the job description and was able to apply.

The rest were from overseas, he said.

“I’m very surprised it didn’t attract more people.”