Supermarket operators in the UK have dismissed fears over imported cucumbers following the outbreak of E. coli that has killed 16 people in mainland Europe so far.
Asda and The Co-operative were among those quick to distance themselves from fears that the product could be potentially harmful.
On Tuesday, 31 May, the outbreak claimed its first victim outside Germany – a woman in her 50s in Sweden – but so far all suspected cases have involved people who recently visited the German city of Hamburg.
A spokesperson for The Co-operative Group said: 'All The Co-operative's fresh conventionally grown cucumbers are British, whilst our organic cucumbers are currently sourced from Holland.
'Spanish-grown cucumbers are used in some of our sandwiches. The grower is accredited to a recognised international quality scheme, and has been visited by our supplier who, as part of their routine quality monitoring, regularly test for the presence of E. coli. No positive results have been highlighted.
'As a responsible retailer, The Co-operative is keeping this developing situation under review and will continue to act in the best interests of our customers.'
Asda continues to sell Spanish cucumbers and will continue to do so until its planned switchover on Thursday, a spokesperson told freshinfo.
“We are very confident of our Spanish suppliers. It is the tail end of the season and we will be moving to 70 per cent British and 30 per cent Dutch so the switch is unrelated.
“The outbreak has so far only been restricted to cucumbers in Germany so I think people are relatively calm about it,” he said.
Sainsbury's and Marks & Spencer are only selling UK-grown produce at present.
Derek Hargreaves, technical manager at the Cucumber Growers Association, said there is likely to be a flood of product on the market as German companies have been cancelling orders from the Netherlands.
Prices have dropped from €0.20 to €0.05-€0.07 a stick for Dutch cucumbers which could flood the wholesale market, according to Hargreaves.
He said: “It is impossible to get E. Coli into a whole cucumbers but you can get it on to it. My speculation is that it would have been during preparation in Germany.”
European Commissioner Dali is expected to provide a statement regarding the E. coli outbreak within the next 24 hours. The commission is providing updates and background information on its website.
The source of the outbreak is as yet unknown, with laboratory tests in Hamburg confirming on Tuesday, 31 May that the EHEC strains on two of the three incriminated cucumbers from Spain did not match the strains found in infected patients.
The two Spanish companies named in the E.coli cucumber alert have claimed that the contamination is unlikely to have taken place on Spanish soil, insisting all tests carried out to date have shown no trace of the bacteria.
Málaga-based Frunet Bio and cooperative group Costa de Almería, which has its headquarters in Roquetas del Mar, Almería, told Eurofruit they believed the contamination with E.coli happened on arrival in Germany or during transportation.
Both companies said they were fully cooperating with the Spanish authorities in addition to carrying out their own investigations, but revealed that no contamination had been detected in the soil, water, pallets or packhouses used by their allied growers.
Precautionary measures have been undertaken by Germany, Belgium and Austria, as well as other EU member states and Russia.
Several countries are pressing for action from the European Commission to support the fruit and vegetable sector, while Spanish authorities have hit back at the reports which it claims has damaged its reputation.
Current estimates put losses at €150m and 230,000 tonnes of produce, although that figure is thought likely to rise in the coming days.
The last major scare of this nature happened in 2006 when infected spinach in the US cost the industry around US$150m.
The Food Standards Agency has said that investigations in Germany and Spain are ongoing and that there is no indication of contaminated product in the UK.
