The UK apple industry is in serious danger of becoming a victim of its own success, warned Tesco senior fruit buyer Martin de la Fuente this week.
“As I have often said, the English apple season is a marathon, not a sprint,” he told freshinfo.
“English Apples & Pears (EAP) has been asked to do a job, which it does very well, but now a bloodlust has been created to get all the fruit sold very quickly. We are trying to turn it into a sprint, but the UK industry cannot go at that pace.”
Packhouses are working beyond their capacity, with extra night shifts organised to cope with demand, de la Fuente added. “We are in danger of selling all the fruit before Christmas, but it should last until February or March. Fruit will be going through packhouses too quickly and without the requisite attention to detail and quality,” he said.
“Tesco is fully supportive of British fruit, as we always said we would be, and I am not criticising Adrian Barlow at EAP, as he has done a good job. But, at the moment we are 100 per cent UK Gala - for how long is that sustainable?
“All the retailers are currently stocking lots of small UK fruit with variable brix levels - but is that what consumers really want, or will it cause long-term damage to the industry?
“Essentially, my fear is that not only are we turning the UK apple season into a sprint, but we could end up right back where we started,” he warned.
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