Page 3 - Fifty-fifty July 2021

This Man Knows His Onions.

by Jan Gould

Did you know that onions were found in the tombs of the Pharaohs of Egypt? And, despite
being uncertain about why one would ever do this - there are a huge number of onion jokes.
If you get to the end of this article, you may find some.

James Kuperus is CEO of New Zealand Onions Inc.
This is an organisation that comes under the umbrella
of Horticulture NZ (HortNZ), which represents New
Zealand’s 6,000 commercial fruit and vegetable
growers. It is an industry valued at more than $6.4
billion (2019), with more than 60 products, providing
60,000 jobs and exporting to more than 124
countries. This is extremely important to the New
Zealand economy.

When I met up with James at his office in Balance
Street, I asked what to me, was the obvious question.
Why did he base his career around onions? I
expected to hear that he had been to either Lincoln or
Massey Universities studying horticulture. Instead,
James has a degree in International Trade and
Marketing and in 2014 he joined Onions New
Zealand. This allowed him to come into Onions NZ at
the ground level and learn all about the industry.
James Kuperus

This was where he became thoroughly enthusiastic
about his job. Onions are a specialised product, a
niche subsector of Horticulture NZ and unlike say
tomatoes, or apples where you can get sauces, paste
and flavourings – onions are a difficult product when
it comes to adding value. Their best value comes
from the whole product. And, even more interesting is
that there is a huge world-wide demand for onions.

New Zealand earns over $173,000,000 from onion
exports and the second largest market for onions is
Indonesia. James is funded from an export levy of
$3.50 per ton of onions exported and his job is to
represent the 85 growers, the 20 exporters and the
30 service companies, agronomists, scientists and
others that are also part of this product.

It was fascinating to learn that onions are part of a
horticultural crop rotation process where over the
year a farm could produce first potatoes, then onions
and then carrots. The reason for this is that if you
keep growing the same crop, the pests that feed on
the crop get beyond critical mass, and a clean green
system cannot be maintained. The different crops use
up different nutrients and also return different
nutrients, such as nitrogen. So crop rotation is a good
soil science practice

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