FRUIT INSPECTOR

Pay rate: NZD $28.00–$32.00 per hour
Guaranteed hours: 30-40 hours per week

Job Purpose

To inspect fruit, orchard operations and produce-handling practices to ensure compliance with the employer’s quality requirements, grower specifications and applicable horticultural industry standards relating to quality, hygiene, traceability and product integrity.

Key Duties and Responsibilities

• Inspect fruit crops and harvested produce to identify quality issues, diseases, pest damage, contamination, physical defects and other conditions affecting marketability.
• Inspect fruit during harvesting, field handling, binning, transportation, storage and preparation for delivery to ensure compliance with required quality standards.
• Assess fruit against prescribed specifications for maturity, size, colour, shape, firmness, sugar content, appearance and freedom from defects.
• Collect, identify and label representative fruit samples from orchards, harvesting teams, bins or production batches for inspection and prescribed quality testing.
• Use suitable inspection and testing equipment, including refractometers, firmness testers, sizing tools, scales and temperature-monitoring devices.
• Monitor orchard and fruit-handling practices to ensure compliance with grower requirements, customer specifications and recognised horticultural quality-assurance procedures.
• Inspect orchards, equipment, fruit bins, storage areas and produce-handling facilities to confirm that appropriate hygiene and contamination-control standards are being followed.
• Verify that fruit is harvested at the appropriate maturity and handled in a manner that minimises bruising, punctures, contamination and deterioration.
• Identify non-conforming fruit or practices and advise supervisors, team leaders and orchard personnel of the required corrective action.
• Place affected fruit on hold, recommend rejection or reclassification, and arrange follow-up inspections where quality requirements have not been met.
• Monitor fruit-grading and sorting activities to ensure produce is consistently classified according to the approved quality specifications.
• Check product identification, orchard block details, batch information and traceability records for accuracy and completeness.
• Record inspection findings, sample results, defects, rejected quantities and corrective actions in the company’s quality-control records.
• Prepare inspection reports and promptly report serious or recurring quality issues to management and the relevant grower or contractor.
• Investigate the likely causes of quality failures and recommend improvements to harvesting, handling, storage and transportation practices.
• Conduct follow-up inspections to ensure corrective actions have been completed and required standards are being maintained.
• Provide workers and supervisors with guidance on fruit-quality requirements, defect identification, hygiene and appropriate produce-handling procedures.
• Maintain inspection instruments and ensure that all equipment is clean, accurate and suitable for use.
• Follow workplace health and safety, food-safety, hygiene and biosecurity procedures at all worksites.
• Travel between the company’s contracted orchards and other horticultural worksites as reasonably required.

Minimum Requirements

Applicants must have either:

• At least two years of relevant work experience in horticultural or a closely related field; or
• a relevant qualification at NZQF Level 5 or higher, or an equivalent recognised overseas qualification.

Pay: $28.00 – $32.00 per hour

Expected hours: 30.0 – 40.0 per week

Work Location: In person

Pay: $28.00 – $32.00 per hour

Expected hours: 30.0 – 40.0 per week

Work Location: In person