Kiwi Heights
Developing a new kiwifruit orchard in Bay of Plenty.
A new kiwifruit orchard, Kiwi Heights, is being developed near Pongakawa in the Bay of Plenty. The operation is part of a wider dairying business run by Steve and Trish Atkinson. Orchard manager Blair Dyer, who is also developing his own orchard nearby, says it will be a high-tech business, using drones for targeted spraying, soil monitoring, and the like. Kiwi Heights was the regional winner in the Ballance Farm Environment Awards for 2025.
Steve Atkinson, along with wife Trish, is at the head of a multi-farm dairy operation, with a home base in Waikato. In 2015 they moved to Chile for a 3-year stint at Manuka, a large-scale permanent pasture model milk producer, of which Steve is now a production committee member. Steve says when it comes to the dairy industry, training and record keeping play a big part - teaching through experience and providing a tight framework around several ‘non-negotiables’. The non-negotiables on a dairy farm include soil fertility, pasture cover, and rotation lengths to prevent unnecessary damage and control residual pasture. He adds it is invaluable in looking at data trends over time, and aims to control what they can, when they can.
This careful attention to detail, and data-driven decision making has transferred across to Kiwi Heights. The total size of the property is 170ha, split over several titles. Kiwi Heights sits on 50ha, with 23.2ha of Kiwifruit (all Gold3), 0.5 ha of male kiwifruit vines, 1.6ha of newly developed vines which they intend to graft this winter, and a 3.5ha lease block leased out for external trials. The rest of the property is used for dairy grazing, servicing the farming operation in Waikato. Just over five hectares has been retired into exotic forestry (Cypress Lusitanica and Pinus radiata) and they are in the process of retiring more land into native bush, of which 10.4Ha so far has been covered.
Blair says the end of February is a quiet time on the orchard, with harvest beginning anytime from the 15th of March, so they tend to stay out of the vines as much as possible before then, with the focus on maintenance and any development work as they look to what land will be planted out in the near future.
Technologies to inform decision making are increasingly common in the industry. Kiwi Heights has implemented soil moisture mapping, using 20 core samples per ha to understand the different soil types, and how vines are reacting in each location. Blair adds throughout summer they monitor how much moisture the plants need and only irrigate as much as needed, to conserve water use. They are also running a trial with a drone company, monitoring canopy health. “Our goal is to get to a point where instead of blanket spraying the entire orchard the spray drone will target plants which are nutrient deficient. This is just in its infancy, and we are working with Zespri around getting this into practice,” says Blair.
Zespri exports all fruit produced, as they only grow G3 which is a licensed variety and protect by a PVR. The fruit is packed with MPac and East Pack. Blair explains both companies have a great ethos in giving the best result financially to the grower. East Pack is Co-op in which Kiwi Heights is shared up over the 1:1 rate, while Mpac is a privately owned business with innovative views on packing and giving as much of the fruit value back to the grower.
Kiwi Heights has also connected with some extension and research programmes, leasing 3.5 ha to Zespri for a trial. While not directly involved in the trials, Steve made the land available to ensure the industry would stay ahead of any potential risks going forward.
While many of New Zealand’s growers recovered following the detection of PSA in 2010, the kiwifruit industry still lives with the challenges of the vine killing disease PSA. “This year has been the worst I’ve seen for plant infection in my 10 years in the industry”, says Blair. “We have a proactive spray plan designed by Horti Centre and focuses on our location. Being higher, colder and more exposed than most of the industry brings its own challenges, but we work with many different scientists to counter act these issues, from an array of businesses.”
Industry bodies are also critical to the enterprise. Blair explains, “Whether it is our 2 post-harvest operators MPac and EastPack, or suppliers such as Ballance Agri nutrients, Farmlands Co Op or Horti Centre, all are crucial in maximizing returns.” Blair speaks or meets weekly with at least one of the businesses for a broader understanding of “everything, from the soils the vines grow in, to the markets in which our fruit is being sold.”
Blair explains his pathway to ownership of an orchard close by has been a huge opportunity. The management structure in place at Kiwi Heights has been modelled off a combination of his own family’s orchard structures and the sharemilking system in the dairy industry. “Steve and Trish have given me the opportunity to set up my own business, employ my own people, and my earnings are pegged to orchard production and development success, in a similar structure to a sharemilking agreement. They have taken a risk and given me this opportunity, including subdividing some land for me to purchase, but what that does is gives me buy-in to the business, and the opportunity to experience both the triumphs and the tribulations. It’s something that is lacking with current management systems in place through most of the kiwifruit industry,” he says.
Blair believes business resilience is crucial. He says, “The high risk, high reward nature of the Gold Kiwifruit industry means that at any one time we have the risk of losing a high value crop, whether that be through nature, human intervention or the pool system the industry has. So, we control the controllables, do what we can to mitigate those we can’t control and then move forward.”