The New Zealand Hops co-operative says its 18 growers, which are in the Nelson region, produced about 750 tonnes of hops, which was 33 tonnes less than the year before.
Chief executive Doug Donelan said the weather had not been right since spring.
“The growing season wasn’t very good. We had a cold summer and prior to that during the early stages it was a very wet spring. The two things you really don’t want when you’re growing hops.”
Mr Donelan said some varieties were hit harder than others.
“We were down 30 percent on some varieties, but overall it was probably down about 10 percent on the previous year… that came off increasing acreage so we actually had more plants in the ground and produced less hops.”
The co-operative is working to increase the production of hops and wants to grow total volume by 30 percent to about 1100 tonnes.