Kōrero: Food and beverage manufacturing

Sir James Wattie (right) holds up a can of tinned spaghetti, flanked by three of the longest-serving workers at the Wattie’s factory in Hastings in 1972. Most New Zealanders’ first taste of pasta was tinned spaghetti in tomato sauce, often eaten on toast for breakfast or lunch. Spaghetti was first made by S. Kirkpatrick and Co. at Nelson in the 1930s. By 1955 spaghetti production had reached 5,000 tonnes – one kilogram per head of population. By 1975 it had risen to 8,700 tonnes, around two kilos per head.