By Monique Steele of RNZ

Farms that rely on fuel are running dry as rural distributors face new limits due to spiking demand.

In Central Hawke’s Bay, the Kirk family’s large dry-stock farm at Ruakawa has run out of fuel.

The farm, a half-hour’s drive south of Hastings, usually received a monthly delivery of bulk fuel for the 600-hectare site, home to up to 700 bulls and 10,000 lambs at peak.

But co-owner Caroline Kirk said the usual order expected 10 days ago never came.

She said the biggest concern was that the reticulated drinking water system for livestock ran on fuel.

“We ran out of diesel last week, and we’ve just run out of unleaded this week,” she said.

“We’re totally reliant on reticulated water from tanks that we pump water to, so there is no back-up really, if we can’t run our pumps, there’s no water.”

Kirk said they were in contact with their rural fuel distributor Fern Energy, which was facing fuel allocation limits from its importers.

Fortunately, they were not feeding out a lot at the moment, she said.

“So yeah, we just have to keep going into town, getting 20-litre containers.

“It seems a bit crazy to be going and burning fuel to go and get more fuel.”

Kirk said she believed primary production would be prioritised, as farming was vital to the economy.

“It would be nice just to know when the fuel truck is arriving and if they could please allocate our rural tankers some fuel so that they can get it delivered to farms, because we need it, yeah, to keep the country going.”

Fuel-hungry farmers being prioritised

Distributor Fern Energy said it was doing its best to prioritise fuel deliveries based on need.

The Ōtautahi-based fuel distributor and storage firm picked up fuel allocated by importers at 11 ports nationwide for its approximately 10,000 primary industry customers nationwide.

Chief executive Chris Gourley said its fuel allocation had been affected by “artificial demand”, driven by panic-buying and stockpiling of fuel as prices soared.

He said it was a complex and challenging situation, as it tried to meet its orders.

“For farmers, if they’ve got no fuel, they can’t work, so it’s really urgent,” Gourley said.

“We have to make decisions around who we think needs that fuel the most. But it’s the same for all distributors.”

Gourley said its teams understood the frequency of farmers’ fuel orders and usage, and assured they were working hard to get to all their primary sector customers.

“We’re looking at which customers are getting close to running out or are dry, and we’re focusing on them first, and we’re working our way through it as best we can.

“Looking at our information around how much fuel that farmer’s used in the past, what time of the season we’re in, and we’re working towards getting to them.”

He said hotspots where allocations were tight included Hawke’s Bay, but also Nelson, Southland and Christchurch.

“Hawke’s Bay around Napier has been a real hotspot for us in regards to access to fuel out of that port.

“You’ve got Nelson and Southland, in particular ... Christchurch is also quite challenged at the moment. It’s moving, it’s dynamic.

“For example, last week, early in the week, Nelson wasn’t too much of an issue, and now it is.”

He recognised it was difficult for farmers in need of fuel, and said that while it was not ideal, those in need may have to seek out their own supply from a truckstop or from other distributors.

“Farmers that are in arable or farmers that are harvesting or cutting grass, they need fuel,” he said.

“So they’re the ones that are really starting to use that fuel quite quickly.

“If you’re in that situation where you’ve got no fuel, look for opportunities to potentially fill up the jerry can at the truckstop.”

Panic-buying affecting country’s supply

Gourley urged the public not to panic-buy petrol, as it was having flow-on effects for the rural sector.

“If you don’t need fuel, don’t enter that market and try to stockpile fuel, because it just really does generate problems for everybody.

“We’re really trying to all of us, the importers, the distributors, everybody’s trying to balance that fuel.

“We have good supplies coming in, but it’s those spikes when demand lifts, particularly artificial demand, which puts pressure on the network.”

He said calls via Fern’s hotline increased fourfold in the weeks after the war began.

The cost of Brent crude oil rose to US$108.50 ($188) per barrel overnight, up more than 6%.

– RNZ