ISLAMABAD/LONDON: Pears and apples could be the next food shortage in the United Kingdom (UK) after it emerged that British growers were planting a third of the number of fruit trees needed to maintain orchards, saying their returns from the sale were unsustainable.
UK trade industry
Ali Capper, head of the British Apples and Pears Trade Association which represents about 80 per cent of the industry in the United Kingdom, said 1 million fresh trees would have to be planted each year to maintain the country’s 5,500 hectares of production.
Farmers had planned to order just 480,000 pear and apple trees this year, but that had been slashed to 330,000 trees. Capper said that the key reason for the lack of investment was “unsustainable supermarket returns”.
She said that fruit growers’ costs had risen by about 23 per cent as the cost of picking, energy, haulage, and packaging had increased, but that was being met by a less than one percent raise in returns. “The majority of growers are losing money.”
Few are planning to quit the industry, others have effectively mothballed their orchards and are grubbing them as the returns dwindle. “This is a dire circumstance,” said Capper. “The future of pear and apple growing in the United Kingdom is doubtful.”
The UK already faces shortages of fresh food goods, prompting Tesco, Asda, Aldi, and Morrisons to limit purchases of certain lines, including tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers.
The shortages have been triggered by freeze weather in North Africa and Spain hitting crops there and by massive cutbacks by Dutch and British growers, who plant salads under glass at that time of year, as growers say supermarkets weren’t prepared to cover the raised cost of heating.
