Simplot is expecting a more productive year for local vegetable growers and says it has no plans to cut jobs at its plant in Tasmania's north west. Simplot employs 300 people at its Ulverstone factory but says it has fewer vegetables to process because of the drought. The company has had to import vegetables from the United States and New Zealand. Simplot's managing director, Terry O'Brien, says there are no plans at this stage to reduce operations.

"At the moment we're running with closing the factory down for periods of time which doesn't involve putting people off or shutting any of the processors down we just run it at a slower pace", he said. "That's okay at the moment but if it became permanent or semi-permanent we'd have to think about that."