With political shocks leading to increasing economic woes and climate change adding to the uncertainty facing businesses, last year was tough to get through. The Met Office says that 2022 was the UK’s warmest year on record and the figures show that climate change is having a real impact. Even the most optimistic of us know that this year will be tougher still for businesses. Repeated warnings from the NFU, highlighting concerns that growers were reducing production to limit losses from soaring inflation and energy bills, and the risk this posed to Britain’s domestic food supply, culminated in a meeting with the Prime Minister just before Christmas. Minette Batters’ list of assistance required includes continued support to farm businesses through the inflation and energy crisis and enabling fair contractual relationships in the supply chain. Anger over little or no support for home-grown fruit this autumn from retailers and continuing poor apple prices has reached boiling point.
The welcome announcement from Defra of a 15,000 increase in SAWS visas for 2023 to 45,000 was a step forward. Since the Government’s food strategy is to increase the amount of fruit and veg grown on home soil, it is self-evident that, to see this ambition realised, growers need longer-term certainty. We need a minimum of a five-year rolling SAWS to give growers the confidence to invest. Also, British Berry Growers wants a relaxation of the six-month rule to allow workers to return in time for the beginning of the season.
Estimates of the UK grape harvest for 2022 predict 13.65 million bottles from 3,200ha of vineyards in production. Even in these cash-strapped times demand for home produced wines has kept up. WineGB ‘s CEO Simon Thorpe says, “GB wine has had another spectacular year: rapidly increasing consumer and trade demand, sales growth of 70% since 2019, and what looks to be a fantastic 2022 vintage, sets the backdrop to an industry that is thriving despite the current political and economic uncertainties”. Full reports from the Vineyard & Winery Show held in late November demonstrate the buoyant mood still evident in this sector. For beleaguered fruit growers there’s a pat on the back via NIAB’s BEESPOKE training event which demonstrated just how valuable wildflowers on fruit farms can be. Find out more about establishing and managing wildflower strips for enhancing pollinators and beneficial insect populations.
The January issue also contains articles on the:
- National Fruit Show
- Nichol Farm apple harvest
- International Strawberry Congress
To read more from the January “The Fruit Grower” subscribe today – find out more here.