Sarah de Bruin
May 2024
Winter stocktake of costs:
Do you know what you have spent this season? Cost awareness is vital to grower success at a time when input costs are high, and market conditions continue to fluctuate.
Use this post harvest and winter period, to sit down and cast your eye over your orchard’s numbers. Be sure to compare how they are stacking up against previous years and industry resources such as the MPI Pipfruit Orchard Monitoring programme.
Identifying the strengths and weaknesses of your own orchard business will help refocus for the new season and show areas or categories where you might be blowing out costs and others where you might be running well and efficiently. This then provides the background to enable good decision making and planning through the winter and into the next season.
Growers need to target quality fruit production, high yields of market targeted size, colour and high grade, in order to maximise available returns. Being cost efficient doesn’t necessarily mean cost cutting. For example, increasing productivity may sometimes involve increasing expenditure, however, ultimately this will provide you with more cartons to spread those costs over.
Some blocks warrant extra effort and potential cost, but in doing so can reward with a more profitable outcome. However, some do not. Understanding where your spending is going means you can make sure you are getting the most bang for your buck.
