Needles in Australian Strawberries
Channel: Daily Insight
Date: 17/09/2018

The strawberry industry in Australia is in crisis. Just over a week ago, a man in Brisbane ate a strawberry and was admitted to emergency with abdominal pain. It turned out that the strawberry had a needle in it, a piece of which he had swallowed. Later, more needles were found and Queensland Health began an investigation. A couple of brands, Berry Licious and Berry Obsession, were found to be implicated in the contamination.

It was initially stated that the perpetrator was probably a disgruntled employee, a lone wolf seeking revenge on the industry that has wronged him. However, now that there are more than seven brands involved –  Berry Licious, Berry Obsession, Donnybrook Berries, Love Berry, Delightful Strawberries, Oasis brands, and Mal’s Black Label – this is obviously more than the actions of a lone wolf. Police claim that there may be copycats at work.

The Queensland government has issued a $100000 reward for information that leads to the arrest of the person responsible.

Western Australian farmers have been forced to dump tonnes of strawberries despite local growers not being affected (until today, that is).

Although the media and the government are claiming that this is probably the work of one or two “evil” people, I have a theory that this goes a lot deeper than they are making out. I theorise that this is a system-wide problem. What we are seeing now is simply a symptom of a much greater issue. Call me crazy, but I think this has to do with the systematic exploitation of foreign workers in the strawberry industry.

My wife, who is Chinese, has had first-hand experience with exploitation as a foreign worker in Australia. Strawberry farms have been slowly replacing all of their staff with foreign nationals.

Other people have claimed that the industry has been underpaying workers for a number of years. There are claims that one farm employed about 500 workers, 300 of which were from India, 190 were Koreans, and only about 10 were Australian. Some workers were only being paid as little as $5 a day.

Other people blame Australians for not wanting to do backbreaking, manual labour resulting in farmers being forced to only hire foreign nationals.

The big supermarkets in Australia have a lot of clout when it comes to influencing the price. If they want to buy cheaper goods, they can pretty much bully the producers into submission.

And I think that’s exactly what is happening with the ongoing needles-in-strawberries disaster. The police are probably right in saying that it’s a “disgruntled worker”, but they should probably go further and change it to “disgruntled workers”.

But what can the industry do? If the supermarkets insist on a certain price, then they either meet that price, or leave the industry.

However, if we keep going the way we are going and allow the producers to underpay their staff, then we’ll forever be caught in a loop of low prices and spiteful workers.

But just to change the course of this conversation a little, I have one prediction – the industry will eventually replace human workers with robots.

So realistically, there are only a couple of outcomes. We continue on the path of underpaid foreign workers and cheap strawberries, knowing that this comes with the risk of sabotage and revenge as we are currently seeing unfold. Or, technology is introduced (robots etc.), keeping the prices low, but leaving the migrant workers without a job.

In the meantime, I guess we just have to accept the fact that there’s a little bit of risk involved in buying cheap strawberries.

But just to finish on a lighthearted note, I’ve come up with a couple of new strawberry brand names: Berry Armful, Berry Painful, and my personal favourite, Berry-No-Needle. Cheers.

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