The much-anticipated first arrivals of new-season UK tomatoes on the market are a welcome sight for consumers and, following a promising winter production period and lower fuel prices than this time last year, producers are upbeat.
It is early days for the season, says Paul Faulkner at Sainsbury’s supplier Freshlink Marketing, but samples have been promising. “The season has only just started, but the initial product that we have had coming through has been superb - we have been delighted with the flavour,” he says. “There are limited volumes available across all lines, but there is a huge demand for the first UK tomatoes because, coming out of the winter season, the quality of imports declines rapidly.”
The UK season traditionally makes a start in February, with volumes increasing throughout March until supply peaks in June and July, coming to an end in November, although limited volumes are produced all year round in greenhouses.
UK tomatoes are some of the best in the world, says Gerry Hayman, chairman of the British Tomato Growers’ Association (TGA), and they are produced in line with what the market wants.
But there is not enough UK supply to meet demand and around 75 per cent of the tomatoes consumed in the UK each year are bought in from overseas. “We would have to produce more than three times as much to displace imports,” says Hayman. “But we are about producing better products in response to what consumers are looking for, with flavour at the top of the list, as well as freshness and nutritional value, and our ambition to use zero pesticides.”
But the volumes produced in the winter months are a third lower than in the summer. “Artificial lighting is supplementary and not a replacement for natural daylight, and light levels are the most limiting factor,” says Faulkner.
This winter has seen some good quality fruit, according to Alan Parker at Isle of Wight-based producer Wight Salads Group, and tonnage has been up 10 per cent on last year.
UK growers are looking to recover from a difficult period last year, he adds. “People are generally very pleased that we got through last year, which was an extremely challenging time as a result of the fuel price hike and quality problems,” he says. “But this year there are more smiles around and, while growers have already overcome one mountain, we are hoping that the situation won’t be repeated.”
But a number of challenges are facing the UK tomato industry this season, according to Hayman, the majority of which are tied in with ongoing environmental debate.
Greenhouse production has been both praised as the way to grow more British fruit and blasted as a threat to the environment, says Hayman, but it is an essential part of the UK industry. “Growing tomatoes in greenhouses protects against the extremes of weather and means we can produce a consistent product in a reliable way, which adds value to the product,” he says. “Outdoor production does not produce what the market wants.”
Energy and its environmental cost is one of the major obstacles facing the UK tomato industry, according to Hayman, and the issue is more complicated than politicians and retailers would have consumers believe.
A Defra-funded study by the Manchester Business School recently concluded that it was better from an environmental perspective to import tomatoes than to grow them under glass in the UK. But Hayman insists that the basis of the findings have taken tomato production both in the UK and overseas out of context. “The study compares UK organic and speciality tomato production, which produce lower yields so have a higher energy cost per kilo than conventional product, with imported commodity fruit,” he says. “This is not a fair comparison. You have to compare apples with apples, as it were.”
Hayman accepts that it takes more energy per kilo to grow long-season tomato crops in the UK than it does to truck them from Spain, but he insists this betrays the bigger picture. “It takes five times the area of plastic in Almería to produce the same yield each year as we do under glass in the UK - plastic that is made from oil and has to be disposed of in some way,” he says. “That means that in the 25-year life of a glasshouse, it would take 60 times the area of polythene to produce the same volume of tomatoes if the polythene is replaced every two years or 120 times if it is replaced every year. And that’s without looking at pesticides and water...
“The public are told that UK tomato production uses more energy than truck miles from Spain, but what about flavour, internal quality, nutritional content and the use of pesticides? All these things have a value and, when they are taken into consideration, UK tomatoes are best,” Hayman insists.
Parker adds that the public has an unrealistic impression of how tomatoes are produced in other countries. “There is a perception that tomatoes produced in Spain are grown outdoors by a Spanish farmer, standing there with a bit straw in his mouth - no plastic, no chemicals,” he says. “But if consumers saw what it was really like, they would be in for a very big surprise.”
Growing demand for speciality tomatoes has contributed to energy use, according to Hayman, and it is unlikely that consumers will go back on their tastes. “The market has driven production into speciality lines, which have a lower yield and higher energy costs than standard varieties,” he says. “So it’s a choice that shoppers have to make.”
But Hayman is concerned that skewed information is being sent out to UK consumers. “The retailers have jumped on the environmental bandwagon, with supermarkets promising to reduce their carbon footprint and food miles, but, at the same time, saying that British produce may not be best in terms of energy use,” says Hayman. “This is sending out mixed messages to consumers.”
Tesco boss Terry Leahy recently spoke out to support the carbon labelling initiative underway as part of his £100 million eco-plan. “We all want to support British farming - politicians and retailers alike have been busy encouraging farmers to extend their growing seasons by growing fruit in greenhouses,” he said. But he added that, while this might mean a boost for UK-grown produce, it will also contribute to the carbon footprint and, crucially, he suggested it might well be better environmentally to import fruit grown out in the open in a sunnier climate.
“But the bottom line is this,” Leahy concluded, “with a simple label that shows a product’s carbon footprint at a glance, millions of consumers will have the information to make those choices and judgements for themselves.”
But where does this leave the UK tomato industry? Plans for Tesco to start carbon labelling its products would add to the confusion surrounding home-grown and imported produce and may obscure healthy eating messages, Hayman says, and this could prove challenging for the industry. “Labels on packs of tomatoes will look like traffic lights when the carbon labelling is carried out - they will get a green light for health and a red light for their carbon footprint, and this will make consumers more confused than they are now.”
The TGA is urging retailers to take a clear, analytical view of the situation. UK tomato production uses a fraction of the energy it used in 1990, when the government set initial targets for carbon reduction - a sign that producers have taken action to improve efficiency and reduce energy use as much as possible, Hayman says. “UK growers are trying desperately hard to reduce energy costs as much as they possibly can, for the environment and themselves because, at the end of the day, they are businessmen and they have to pay for it,” he adds.
The energy input used for UK production should be weighed against added value such as better flavour, internal quality and external appearance, nutritional content and a reduction in the use of pesticides, Hayman says. “One of the most important points of difference in the UK is that we can get product to the market in 24 hours,” adds Parker.
Energy makes up half of UK tomato production costs and, as such, efficiency is a top consideration for growers. “Everyone is focused on how they can continue to grow UK tomatoes in a sustainable way,” says Faulkner. “Growers are increasingly focused on how they can work hand in hand with environmental issues. The situation is a lot bigger than heating greenhouses and food miles.”
Greenhouse production could gain from the way that energy is generated in the UK, according to Hayman, and the TGA is encouraging the use of CHP technology, bio gas and the use of excess energy from industrial processes for growing glasshouse crops.
This joined-up thinking could be the future of greenhouse production and an increasing number of link-ups are being established across the UK. Half the glasshouses on the Isle of Wight have been run with a combined heat and power system from nearby CHP stations for the last four years, says Parker. “This answers environmental concerns in the medium term,” he says. “This is a very good story, but the frustration among UK growers is that the efficiency is not as good as it could be.”
Wight Salads has reinforced its commitment to environmental considerations with the completion of an eight million-gallon reservoir to collect roof water to reduce dependency on boreholes and a composting plant for organic production will be finished in May.
But the environmental questions surrounding the use of greenhouses to grow UK tomatoes have not stopped growers from putting up more glass. This year has seen an 11 per cent increase in total UK production area - the highest figure since 2002, according to a TGA survey, with the area earmarked for vine-harvested types reaching 47 per cent of the total and a reduction in the area for classic product has seen it drop to less than 30 per cent.
“There is more demand for British tomatoes now than I can remember,” says Parker, “and the increase in glasshouses has come in response to growing demand for UK fruit.”
Freshlink growers have continued to put up a substantial amount of glass, according to Faulkner, with more than 30 acres put up in the last two years. “The last few years have seen a significant amount of glass being put up across the sector - the reverse of what was happening before when the acreage was in decline,” he says. “The general increase in glass has been the source of a lot of positivity in the UK.”
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