Exporters of Spanish vegetables and salads have been experiencing problems with a cold and damp spell that has covered the majority of southern Spain in the last few days.
As a result, there is a shortage of product coming through for non-supermarket customers in the UK and what is available on the spot market is at a high price.
The German market has taken nearly all the available cucumbers from Spain in the last few days, despite being forced to pay excessive prices for the time of the season, and capsicum prices are also on a rapid upward curve. Onions have tightened up over the course of the last seven days, due to good demand from the Germans, and also from Scandinavia.
However, Spanish courgettes are bucking the trend to date, with a sufficient quantity of good quality arrivals reported. The next hurdle to cross is the transport costs, as the citrus exporters begin to compete for space on trucks coming out of Spain for northern Europe.
