New Zealand hops are some of the most coveted varieties in the brewing world. Breweries and brewers around the globe scramble to get a share of Aotearoa’s hoppy goodness.
The international demand, capacity to increase hop production within the local industry and the relatively short turnaround for newly planted bines to yield made it a perfect investment opportunity. In early 2021 the PLPF partnership with Waimea West Hops – then, a roughly 30-hectare hop farm growing eight hop varieties – was established.
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Our team recently popped down to New Zealand’s hotbed of hop farming in sunny Nelson to visit Waimea for the annual hop harvest in March.
Waimea’s 2022 harvest yielded 17% more than the previous year, and 2023’s harvest is anticipated to be 2-3 times bigger than when PLPF invested, thanks to a land expansion for the farm and brand new technology that will increase production.
Whilst the most recent hops harvested bounced through the vintage 1952 processing machinery, Waimea Managing Director, Ben Geisen, showed us the gravel pad behind the existing processing plant, soon destined to become a concrete pad on which a new shed will be built by July 2022, ready for arrival of a whole new hop processing machine from the United States.
Three to four American engineers will visit Waimea to commission the machinery over several months, aiming to have it set up by the end of the year, ready to go for the 2023 harvest in March.
Also contributing to the increasing crop is the new Teapot Garden, a plot named for its location on Teapot Valley Road, which is currently under development. This new site will more than double Waimea’s footprint from 28-29 hectares to approximately 62 hectares.
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Ben says they have already planted hops on two to three hectares of the Teapot site, giving Waimea a kick start with a small first year crop.
“We summer planted – about six months early – about half on Teapot, and the balance will be conventionally spring planted, so the whole site will be producing for the 2023 harvest, and be in full production in 2024,” he says.
Ben says partnering with Booster has been “awesome for Waimea”.
“From an overall business point of view, the investment has allowed us to double, if not triple, our production, and enabled us to go from a small, middle-of-the-road business to what, from a scalable point, should be one of the leading farms in the next few years,” he says.
“From a location point of view, we’ve increased our land footprint and our plan is to continue to expand. We’re currently looking for sites to get up to and beyond 100 hectares.”
“Without this investment we just wouldn’t have been able to grow, we would’ve been stuck as that middle-of-the-road business.”
Ben says Waimea’s partnership with Booster has also enabled the hop farm to focus on increasing its growing programme of premium New World hop varieties that have a bigger demand from around the world, such as Riwaka, Nelson Sauvin and one of the newest hops, Nectaron. Further garden developments are expected to be weighted to new and yet to be released varieties, with the existing gardens also having their mix refreshed.
The new technology and machinery play a huge role in this, as it allows Waimea to produce more hops and a higher quality product.
“The new machinery will enable us to have more of those hops in the ground. Hops often have to be picked at the same time, and the premium picking window might only be 3-4 days for a hop like Nectaron. If you don’t have updated machinery, this restricts how much you can plant.
“We’ll be able to scale up in the varieties that are more in demand and that we want to plant, which means we can tailor the business to the local and global market.”
And that’s something to raise a hoppy glass to.
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Read more about Booster’s Private Land and Property (PLPF) investment fund.
The Booster Innovation Fund (fund) is part of the Booster Innovation Scheme 2 which is issued and managed by Booster Investment Management Ltd (Booster). The fund’s Product Disclosure Statement is available at www.booster.co.nz