What a difference a fortnight makes in the produce trade. Earlier in August, displays of English brassicas ravaged by the weather were hardly holding their own on the retail shelves, and imports from across the continent and the Atlantic were plugging the gap.

This week, there seem to be more Union Jacks on packaging than ever before, although the key question would still seem to be whether the continuity of obviously depleted crops - and in some cases, cauliflower is still looking worse for wear - will last through until the autumn.

The recent problems may have also given organic produce a boost. The “buy a veg box” strategy, which several growers have developed with great success to sell direct to the public, also seems to have crossed into new territory, in that Tesco is now selling its on-line equivalent in store.

To refer to my original point on nationality, the medium-sized organic selection box, provided by Shropshire’s, for £10, contains 10 lines, eight of which are British. Spain is the source for cucumbers, and the apples come from New Zealand.

Tesco’s TV ads are still trumpeting its ongoing price reductions on five lines of fruit and veg throughout the year, but it seems the retailer is not entirely alone. A visit to my local Lidl found reductions of up to 70 per cent across the whole sector.

One of the biggest bargains must have been what was described as white radish sourced from Germany - probably better known as mooli in the UK. Priced at 59p each, the roots were so large, one customer actually asked me if they were sold by the foot!

On the wider seasonal front, all the signs show that autumn is drawing nearer with the arrival of English sweetcorn. The market may have segmented, bringing with it twin packs, cobettes and the like, but there is still a demand for the raw, harvested product - so much so that the consumer message at Sainsbury’s, printed above single loose cobs at 54p each, is worth repeating. It explains that the product still tastes great, although cobs are different sizes. The key for me was the phrase “this helps use more of the farmer’s crop” - an ideal which the top-fruit industry has been preaching to the multiples as a whole for years!

And finally, they have never been the most attractive product on the shelf, although like the egg, they probably represent one of the most efficient forms of packaging in nature. I am talking, of course, about the coconut.

In this case, however, I do not mean the brown hairy object associated with funfairs, but the freshly harvested nuts used to form the container for tropical drinks, associated with Hawaii. Coco Verde (or green coconuts) from Costa Rica may be more commonplace on ethnic street markets, but they are now part of Tesco’s tropical range at 79 each - and as the picture above shows, the labelling even tells the buyer where to cut open the fruit to drink from. Cheers!

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