UK Drought Hits Veg Harvests, Forces Spain Imports
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- UK retailers and wholesalers are importing lettuce and broccoli from Spain at peak growing season as drought and extreme heat hit domestic farms, with wholesale tomato prices up more than 60%, iceberg lettuce up 90%, and potatoes up over 40%.
- Riviera Produce in Cornwall has seen broccoli yields halve, with board member David Simmons saying growers are combining two heads of broccoli to meet pack weight and warning cauliflowers could go short within weeks.
- English pea harvest is down a third according to Stephen Francis of Fen Peas, a group of 60 Lincolnshire farmers, though Scottish growers — accounting for about a fifth of UK pea production — expect an average harvest.
- Yorkshire carrot grower Rodger Hobson, who produces roughly 4% of the UK crop, called the year "the worst we've ever known," saying crops wilt above 25C and "pretty much start to die" above 30C, with domestic carrots potentially running out months early without significant rainfall.
- Tesco, Sainsbury's, Waitrose and Aldi joined more than 100 organisations in writing to Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham to warn that wildfires and extreme weather threaten UK food security and to urge reduced reliance on food imports.
- Nationwide Produce boss Tim O'Malley said the situation is "worse than the public realise" and "we are running out of water," noting his firm last week returned to Spanish suppliers — unusual at this point in the summer — because Spanish farms are "more used to farming in these conditions."
- Potato growers are bracing for a smaller main-crop harvest in September or October, with GB Potatoes chief executive Scott Walker warning consumers will see "more variation in sizes of potatoes" because the European heatwave will also hit supply there.
- The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board confirmed a year of hot, dry weather has delivered the earliest UK cereals harvest in at least 20 years, as farmers call on the government to help fund reservoirs to store winter and spring rain for summer irrigation.
Why it matters: Britain produces 97% of its own carrots but concentrates production in a handful of regions with sandy soils, so a single weather shock can compress the entire supply line within months. With 100-plus organisations — including all the major supermarkets — now publicly telling government to treat food security as a national priority, the crisis has moved from farm-level concern to a formal policy demand for water-storage investment and reduced import dependence.
