UK apple growers are under fire for ignoring the needs of the wholesale sector.
The lax attitude of growers to the needs of their wholesale customers has led to countless missed opportunities, the interim findings of a new study have revealed.
The report, by leading apple grower Ian Mitchell, has revealed producers are not meeting the requirements of the wholesale sector and are therefore failing to exploit the potential that exists.
He said producers’ attitudes need to change. “A lot of growers use the markets to get rid of fruit that’s not up to supermarket specifications and wholesalers do feel they are being used for non-spec fruit.
“Why not work with the wholesalers and find out what the markets want? There will be a market for lower quality fruit, but you have to identify it, not just send pallets up there and moan when it gets knocked out at a lower price.”
He said the study was prompted by the disappointing performance of UK apples and pears in the wholesale sector. “I got wind of the fact UK fruit share in the wholesale market was declining and that didn’t make sense,” he said. “It seemed to me that things were sliding and I wanted to find out why.”
Armed with a £20,000 grant from the South East England Development Agency, Mitchell launched a project to investigate the potential to increase English top-fruit sales through the wholesale sector in London and southern England.
The interim results show growers need to understand the sector better, he said: “Growers in the past, haven’t had a lot of interest in what is required, and that hasn’t changed. It’s time for them to reconnect and make the effort to find out each market’s requirements.”
Packaging is a particular problem, he said, with producers making little to no effort, often simply using second-hand packaging. “A customer with no particular allegiance to UK produce will choose the better presented imported fruit over scruffily presented UK apples.”
However, allegations that English growers use the wholesale markets to offload lower quality fruit have been refuted by one leading UK top-fruit marketing desk. Graham Bassett, of Worldwide Fruit, said: “From our perspective, we try to be sensible with what we place on the wholesale market. We don’t use it as a dumping ground because the costs and expenses are so high, it’s easy to end up with a negative return.”
Mitchell acknowledges not all producers are alike: “Not all suppliers have ignored the wholesale markets and there are some who talk to them, but an awful lot don’t.
“There are huge opportunities being missed, attitudes need to change and I’m hoping what we’re doing will help,” he added.
The next step of the project will see Mitchell trial consignments of apples into selected wholesale markets to test the scope for uptake.
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