Ni-Vanuatu workers coming to New Zealand for seasonal employment are enjoying the benefits of a one-way travel bubble, but their mission abroad comes with steep challenges.
Around 150 ni-Vanuatu landed in Christchurch on Monday for work in the Recognised Seasonal Employer scheme in New Zealand's South Island.
RSE work offers them a chance to earn money to help their families back home, while providing much needed labour for New Zealand's horticulture and viticulture sectors
Coming from a covid-free country, ni-Vanuatu workers are exempt from managed isolation and quarantine at New Zealand's border, and instead isolate at their workplace.
Vanutau's deputy commissioner of Labour, Jalen Willie said the workers have all been required to begin their vaccination process before coming to New Zealand.
"Yeah we are in the process now to put the vaccine as mandatory for all the workers," he said.
"So the (RSE) workers were advised to make sure that they'd received the first dose of the vaccine. And for those who have received the first dose of the vaccine, they are supposed to receive the second dose before boarding the flight."
Vanuatu was the first Pacific country to participate in New Zealand's RSE scheme, and in the last "normal" year before the pandemic, 2019, provided the largest single contingent from any one country, with more than 4-thousand workers, or over a third of all the RSE workers.
The full number of participants from each source country is well down this year, and contractors in the fruit picking sector in particular have been desperate to get as many as possible over to New Zealand.
The Vanuatu's National Workers Union has been helping RSE workers coming to New Zealand understand terms of their contract, including various deductions from their pay due to costs for things like transport, accommodation and laundary.
Under some RSE contractors, these costs lumped on workers are prohibitive. Furthermore, under rules set out in some cases by their own government, there are tight restrictions on what workers can do with their time out of work.
According to a union representative, Gremson Valua, it's not always clear to the workers, especially those coming over for the first time, what they are getting into.
"They should understand clearly the content of their contract before signing them, and understand the process of raising the grievances if any arise in New Zealand," he said.
He said the union has been helping RSE workers to link up the New Zealand-based Amalgamated Workers Union
Valua said this was of extra importance given how a number of Vanuatu's RSE workers in New Zealand have been unable to return home since the pandemic began, and sometimes get left in limbo between contracts.
"Sometimes they're left without contract and it is for the worker to pay their rent, without job, without working, and this is the other issue they're facing in this Covid."