More than 60 per cent of fruit and vegetable production sites in Spain’s region of Murcia have suffered “serious” financial damage as a result of the recent German E.coli outbreak.
This was the assessment of regional fresh produce association Asaja Murcia, which said that the incomes of producers of tomatoes, lettuce, peppers, broccoli and other products had been put in “great jeopardy” by the so-called ‘cucumber crisis’, as it is known in Spain.
In a statement, the association said its technicians had found that “as much spring vegetables as winter crops” had been affected by the “terrible cucumber crisis”, which had principally affected growers in Murcia’s Cartagena and Guadalentín Valley provinces.
Faced with this situation, Asaja Murcia said it considered that “the horticultural sector needs a strong boost and, as well as modernising production, we need to reduce the costs of production, use marketing and promotion to their full potential and encourage the integration of new generations of Murcian growers”.
