One of the country’s biggest food businesses scales down amid ongoing South Australia drought

ABC NEWS (Australia)

One of the nation’s biggest food businesses has scaled back its processing operations in South Australia as an ongoing drought continues to impact the state. Thomas Foods International has stood down hundreds of production workers at its Lobethal meat processing facility but says most workers will be offered other work. Despite the assurances, there are concerns for the future of workers from overseas.

Transcript

00:00Workers this meet processes in the Adelaide Hills facing an uncertain future.

00:08The local MP believes more than 300 jobs are on the line.

00:12It's the middle of winter, they've got bills to pay and they've been on an enforced period

00:16of leave and they've now come back expecting to get work and don't have work.

00:20A part of the workforce, around 50 Pacific Islander employees working in Australia under

00:26a labour scheme.

00:27So they've come back ready to get back into the scheme of things, earn money and to be

00:34faced with this, it's quite a slap in the face.

00:38Thomas Foods says the decision to move to an extended single shift reflects drought conditions

00:43and lower livestock supply.

00:46It says employees will be offered work at other sites if they're not required at Lobethol

00:51and that the company is focused on keeping job losses to a minimum.

00:55Thomas Foods says sheep numbers won't recover from the drought before 2027 despite recent

01:01rainfall.

01:01It could last for years and we know that the flow-on effect to not only for farmers but

01:06across the state and to families as well could be quite detrimental.

01:10That's really disappointing, it's very sad for those workers and I hope that we're able

01:15to move through that very quickly and have those workers come back on board as quickly as possible.

01:20Mr Tavui says workers were told about the situation on Friday.

01:24I could hear them hearing their voices that they're looking for solutions.

01:29A call for clarity on their future.

01:31Closed captioning by Michael

01:48.

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