With Cyclone Gabrielle devastating the nation's bowls of fresh produce, supply shortages are already being felt here, prompting Tauranga garden suppliers to advise we get busy in our own backyards.

Cyclone Gabrielle lashed Aotearoa four weeks ago, flooding kumara fields in Northland, washing onions onto South Auckland roadsides, and thwarting crops with water and silt in both Gisborne and Hawkes Bay.

'This is the biggest season out of all the years I've worked at garden centres that [I think] people should start to learn, or to grow their own veges and herbs,” says Pacifica Home & Garden Store manager Janet Walker. 'There's going to be a lot less availability of fresh fruit and veges because of what's happened in Hawkes Bay because there's a lot of stock that's been wiped out.”

Fresh greens

Nationwide seed retailer King Seeds co-owner Gerard Martin says fresh greens in particular will reach a premium 'once [Hawkes Bay growers] start to rely on land that can't be cultivated on anymore or not in the future anyway”.

Tauranga's Community Foodbank manager Nicki Goodwin says fresh produce is something the charity is already short of and is now being exasperated by Cyclone Gabrielle's impacts.

Huge price hikes

'We rely on one of our local community gardens and we use some of the rescued food through the supermarket, which has really dried up. Basically because if the supermarkets are struggling to get fresh fruit and vege, obviously there's less to pass on as rescued food. We've seen huge price hikes due to weather-related things over the last few month... we've had to give out less quantity so it's very real. It's something that we look at daily really as to what we can afford to spend, versus what we need to give.”

Vegetables NZ chair John Murphy says the situation is quite dire as this is traditionally when vegetables are in abundance, meaning lower prices.

'Our growers' plight is why we're encouraging NZers to continue to support local livelihoods by buying fresh, nutritious NZ-grown vegetables, when they can. This support will be gratefully received by growers, quite a few of which are facing incredible uncertainty at the moment.”

With Envirohub BOP's Sustainable Backyards in full swing, it's the perfect time to get growing.

Gerard is hosting a microgreens workshop on March 27. Visit: envirohub.org.nz