UK soft fruit production could be forced to relocate to other countries to ensure access to labour, trade industry body warns

The price of British strawberries could rise by more than a third if the UK cannot ensure access to European workers after Brexit, farmers have warned. Producers have called on the government to introduce a permit scheme for seasonal workers to ensure that the expansion of soft fruit production in the UK is not brought to a halt.

Their warning comes as farmers say the number of seasonal workers coming to the UK this year has already dropped by 17% this year, because the lack of clarity on the future for EU workers in post-Brexit Britain and a drop in the value of sterling have hit recruitment.

The National Farmers’ Union said there were more than 1,500 unfilled vacancies on British farms in May alone. A survey of labour providers by the union found that a fourfold rise in those unable to meet farms’ requirements between January to May this year.

The NFU’s concerns come as a report commissioned by the British Summer Fruits trade body estimates that if UK-based producers are forced to move their operations to countries within the EU to ensure access to labour, the price of strawberries will rise from around £2 per 400g punnet to £2.75 – a jump of 37%. Replacing homegrown raspberries with imported fruit would see the price of a 200g punnet jump 50% from £2 to £3.

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Farmers say access to EU workers is vital to sustain the industry, as more than nine out of 10 seasonal pickers and packers of British soft fruit currently come from the European Union, primarily Poland, Bulgaria and Romania. Demand for seasonal staff is expected to rise to around 31,000 by 2020 if the industry continues to grow at its current pace.

The soft fruit industry, which supplies raspberries, strawberries, blackberries and blueberries, is now worth more than £1.2bn, up 131% in the past 20 years, largely because of a rise in homegrown strawberry production. In 1996 we ate 67,000 tonnes of strawberries a year, and by 2015 this had leapt to 168,000 tonnes —a rise of 150%.

The soft fruit industry is one of the UK’s biggest users of EU seasonal labour as it is harder to mechanise the handling of its delicate and tricky-to-pick produce, but its warnings echo those of the wider farming community.

Andrea Leadsom, the former secretary of state for the environment, food and rural affairs, who was succeeded by Michael Gove this month, had suggested that farmers invest in machinery to boost productivity. But farmers say appropriate technology requires heavy investment and will not be a solution in the short term.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest British farmers say nine out of 10 of their seasonal workers come from the EU, primarily Poland, Bulgaria and Romania. Photograph: Alamy

Laurence Olins, chairman of British Summer Fruits, which accounts for 97% of all berries supplied to UK supermarkets, said: “This is as extreme as it gets. If we do not have the pickers, we do not have a soft fruit industry.

“It is inconceivable that people who voted to leave the European Union wanted to destroy an iconic and incredibly competitive British horticulture industry. And there is no letup in the demand. Sales continue to increase year on year.



“But if we cannot ensure access to the seasonal workers needed to produce soft fruit in Britain, that will be an unintended consequence of Brexit – along with soaring prices and increased reliance on imports.”

David Kay, of Hall Hunter Partnership, a grower for Waitrose, Marks & Spencer and Tesco that employs about 3,000 seasonal labourers from 20 different countries, said he had tried to recruit British workers, but had found it difficult. “We have worked with jobcentres and with ex-prisoners, but British people don’t want to do these jobs,” he said.

British Summer Fruits says the industry is already suffering form labour shortages as the fall in the value of the pound has reduced take-home pay for EU nationals, while some feel less welcome, or even fear being attacked, since the Brexit vote.

Fruit producers say labour shortages are now at their worst level since before 2004, when people from the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia were given the right to work in the UK.