diff --git a/pkg/cluster/k8sres.go b/pkg/cluster/k8sres.go
index 778318d46..9b80a4525 100644
--- a/pkg/cluster/k8sres.go
+++ b/pkg/cluster/k8sres.go
@@ -731,7 +731,7 @@ func (c *Cluster) generateSpiloPodEnvVars(uid types.UID, spiloConfiguration stri
 		},
 	}
 	if c.OpConfig.EnablePgVersionEnvVar {
-		envVars = append(envVars, v1.EnvVar{Name: "PGVERSION", Value: c.Spec.PgVersion})
+		envVars = append(envVars, v1.EnvVar{Name: "PGVERSION", Value: c.GetDesiredMajorVersion()})
 	}
 	// Spilo expects cluster labels as JSON
 	if clusterLabels, err := json.Marshal(labels.Set(c.OpConfig.ClusterLabels)); err != nil {