Source: Radio New Zealand
Tapawera’s Hop Revolution during the 2026 harvest. SUPPLIED/HOP REVOLUTION
Hop farmers who have wrapped up this season’s harvest are flying the flag in the United States, despite is being a complex time for trading with that key market.
Thirsty Americans enjoy New Zealand hops in their tap and bottled beers, and the country has been through a craft beer boom in recent years.
But the market once considered a home-run is now much more difficult and expensive for hop exporters to access, due to increased import tariffs, production costs and shipping challenges in the global supply chain.
Hop Revolution grows hops key to beer brewing on 325 hectares across two farms in Tapawera in the Tasman district at the top of the South Island.
The company supplies its hops to local Stoke beers, one of the many ventures of late craft beer legend Terry McCashin, an angel investor in Hop Revolution in its earlier years.
The exports are also now on board ships to the US, into Europe but also into newer markets like Mexico.
High quality hops picked at Hop Revolution in Tapawera during the 2026 harvest. SUPPLIED/HOP REVOLUTION
Tariffs, global uncertainties prompt diversification
Company co-founder and plant scientist, Dr Susan Wheeler said the US remained its dominant market, but import tariffs enforced last year and extra costs forced some diversification.
“The US has remained a major customer for us, but obviously in the last year with certain tariffs and uncertainties, we’ve really been expanding out into other countries,” she said.
“So now I would say we’re pretty well diversified, so about 25 percent goes to the US, about 25 [percent] to Europe, we’ve now got South America and Asia.
“China in the last six months has become a focal point for us because of the [US] tariffs.”
Wheeler said war in the Persian Gulf added to uncertainties around shipping and production costs, worsened by tariff cost increases.
“We had containers on the water, then we had tariffs imposed, so we had to in some cases renegotiate with customers. In some cases, we had to wear those tariff increases ourselves.
“The Americans themselves, I mean, a lot of them are very understanding about us having to increase pricing in some cases.
“New Zealand exporters, you know, we’re all facing those same issues.”
The 2026 hop harvest started late due to plant stress from back-to-back floods across the top of the South Island in July. SUPPLIED/HOP REVOLUTION
She said New Zealand having free trade agreements with so many other countries allowed it to compete against American hops to other parts of the world.
Hop Revolution was one of several local firms that travelled to Philadelphia this week for the three-day Craft Brewers and BrewExpo America Conference, that started on Monday.
Wheeler said it would be a good chance to promote the brand and get face-to-face with existing and new clients.
Meanwhile, other New Zealanders in the hop sector were set to speak at the event, including Jos Ruffell the co-founder of Hāpi Research and Freestyle Hops, and Dr Peter Birchamm of Garage Project.
A ‘tricky’ harvest following floods
Wheeler said this year’s harvest was later and smaller than usual, because of floods that struck the top of the South Island in July.
“I think we’d all agree that it was a tricky harvest… we kind of hit it pretty hard, pretty late.”
She said the upside was that while plant stress affected yields, the hop quality was fantastic.
“The yields were definitely down, so talking to other growers in the Nelson region, we all had lower than average yields, but the flip side was the quality was exceptional.”
She said one farm came away unscathed, but the other sustained damage from the winter storms.
“We had a lot of fence damages, we had a lot of stilt on some blocks, we lost some river edging, we almost lost the pump house, but because of that heavier soil, that’s almost what we think has impacted the plants the most during harvest.
“An event that happened nine months beforehand has that flow-on effect to what the plants produced at harvest time.”
It marked the company’s seventh harvest, after being first founded in 2014.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
