For anyone in the horticultural industry, be they growers, category managers, one of the few remaining greengrocers or supermarket produce buyers, there would have been a few surprises in the second part of Supermarket Secrets, on Channel 4 this week.

What will be interesting is to see what reaction - if any - there is from the Big Four, who declined to take part, the NFU or the various grower associations regarding the revelations that presenter Jane Moore uncovered.

A high proportion of the hour-long Dispatches exposé was devoted to fruit and vegetables and the programme coursed down the track, hardly taking breathe, criticising what it considered was the unnecessarily high emphasis on cosmetic specifications to make produce counters look pristine, in the search for higher margins and at the expense of taste.

Cucumbers are always good for a laugh, and it's amazing how the simple process of washing, grading and packing potatoes can be made to fit the bill and make a point. Mind you I never knew that Greefa graders, which photograph blemishes, were a by-product of the Israeli defence programme.

But, because of the retail customer’s insistence on perfection, up to 30 per cent of crops are thrown away, claimed the programme.

It also pointed out there are fewer wholesale markets left to take the surplus, although no-one made the obvious connection with the fact reported earlier that their customers - traditional retailers - were becoming extinct because of the intensity of the competition.

However, a shopping basket comparison went some way to refuting the claim that multiples offer value for money. What appeared to be a street market was cheapest, at £6.61, against Tesco (£7.30), Asda (£7.59) and Sainsbury's (£7.63).

Once having caught the scent of price, Moore was only an aisle away from the now perennial discussion on the boom of prepared salads. Viewers were introduced to the mysteries of modified atmosphere referred to as ‘a cocktail of gases’.

And while 200g of Asda iceberg at 66p is obviously more expensive than 58p for a whole head double the weight, it was a pity that the savings of the various mixes were never mentioned.

I had just begun to think that researchers had forgotten about taste, when Spanish shoppers gave their negative opinion on the flavour of tomatoes sold on UK shelves, compared with their own bumpy green varieties which if the camera did not lie were a special variety grown north of Alicante and considered a luxury.

Support even came from ex-Safeway chief Carlos Criado Perez, who claimed that Spain exports to the UK produce the Spanish will not.

Back home, our apples and soft fruit did not escape. Kent has been ringing with sounds of incredulity since the assumption was aired that Elsanta was referred to as ‘the bouncing berry’.

But I feel the programme would have won some applause when it came to BOGOFs - a word seldom heard coming out of the small screen. Fruit grower Clive Baxter, one of the few producers interviewed (or should that be prepared to be interviewed?) revealed that conforming to the his customer’s request to a lengthy BOGOF on raspberries last year had cost his business £50,000. Not many suppliers are so frank, although most have similar stories to tell.

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