Get 40% Off
🤯 This Tech Portfolio is up 29% YTD! Join Now to Get April’s Top PicksGet The Picks – Just 99 USD

Hail, high water and lockdown: Europe's fruit growers prepare for tough harvest

Published 07/31/2020, 02:05 AM
Updated 07/31/2020, 02:21 AM
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Apples are seen on a tree in an orchard near Borgloon

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Apples are seen on a tree in an orchard near Borgloon

By Gus Trompiz, Sybille de La Hamaide and Nigel Hunt

PARIS/LONDON (Reuters) - Europe's been eating more fruit under lockdown, by all accounts. The problem is, it could struggle to find people to pick it.

The region's growers are preparing for upcoming summer and autumn harvests of apples, pears and grapes, including those of the Champagne variety - though they say they may have little to celebrate.

Many fear there will be resurgent outbreaks of COVID-19 in parts of Europe - like the current one in Spain - leading to localised lockdowns and the risk they will be cut off from the migrant workers they have long relied on.

"We are worried," said Daniel Sauvaitre, head of a French apple and pear association and deputy head of fruit and vegetable federation Interfel. "We had the manpower we needed for the thinning work in orchards, and the harvest looks pretty good. But we may very well have a country that's closing again."

COVID-19 cases among agricultural workers, including on some fruit farms in southern France, are adding to concerns, with labourers often living in cramped conditions that make social distancing tough.

This was highlighted when more than 70 workers who were picking and packing vegetables tested positive at a farm in England earlier this month.

"For some farmers, normally 1% of their workforce would be British, this year for some farmers it is between 20 to 30%," said Ali Capper, an apple and pear grower in central England who chairs the National Farmers' Union's horticulture committee.

In Portugal, berry farms turned to thousands of migrant workers from South Asia who were already in the country and lost jobs in tourism during the lockdown.

There are now worries that it might be harder to recruit locally for the apple harvest in September as many workers have now returned to their previous jobs outside farming.

CHAMPAGNE STRAITS

In France, the Champagne grape harvest looms large in the farm labour cycle, with producers taking in between 100,000 and 120,000 seasonal workers every year, of which 27% come from abroad, according to Christophe Pernet, chairman of champagne winemakers group SGV.

Producers have been contacting universities and job centres to promote harvest work with a view to covering a shortage of foreign labourers if borders close again, he said.

Champagne grape growers are in a quandary; demand has been dented owing to the collapse of restaurant and tourism activity, which has squeezed finances. But even if it picks up, they may be unable to capitalise as migrant labour is drying up.

Big producers are likely to cut back on harvest volumes and take on fewer seasonal workers, said Richard Buxant, product manager at WiziFarm, a start-up that runs a job-matching website for farming.

Earlier in the year, European fruit growers had managed to navigate spring harvests of crops such as strawberries, melons, peaches and cherries as they fell around the time when lockdowns were first introduced and farms had enough labour in hand.

Locked-down shoppers across the world also embraced healthier eating, buying more fruit and vegetables and cutting spending on ready-made meals, according to a survey of nearly 11,000 people in 11 countries at the University of Antwerp.

However much of the migrant labour has since left for home amid the pandemic. And even if growers can find local replacements, some complain that they are not as productive, adding to costs.

..AND THE WEATHER

On top of such unprecedented problems, there's the more familiar, and perennial challenge for farming: the weather.

Heavy rain and hailstones damaged some crops this year in Spain, the European Union's biggest fruit exporter.

Joaquin Gomez, head of APOEXPA, an association of fruit producers and exporters in the southeastern Spanish region of Murcia, estimates local production fell 20% due to adverse weather, but demand and prices held up as households consumed more fruit during the lockdown.

"A campaign that in April we saw with much uncertainty has developed very normally,".

Capper in England also expressed relief that, as least so far, the sector's worst fears have not yet been realised.

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Workers collect grapes in a Taittinger vineyard during the traditional Champagne wine harvest in Pierry

"At the end of March it was difficult to see a way through it but we've got there through a combination of chartered flights bringing in eastern Europeans and growers recruiting locally. Both have worked but there is a long way to go."

Latest comments

Risk Disclosure: Trading in financial instruments and/or cryptocurrencies involves high risks including the risk of losing some, or all, of your investment amount, and may not be suitable for all investors. Prices of cryptocurrencies are extremely volatile and may be affected by external factors such as financial, regulatory or political events. Trading on margin increases the financial risks.
Before deciding to trade in financial instrument or cryptocurrencies you should be fully informed of the risks and costs associated with trading the financial markets, carefully consider your investment objectives, level of experience, and risk appetite, and seek professional advice where needed.
Fusion Media would like to remind you that the data contained in this website is not necessarily real-time nor accurate. The data and prices on the website are not necessarily provided by any market or exchange, but may be provided by market makers, and so prices may not be accurate and may differ from the actual price at any given market, meaning prices are indicative and not appropriate for trading purposes. Fusion Media and any provider of the data contained in this website will not accept liability for any loss or damage as a result of your trading, or your reliance on the information contained within this website.
It is prohibited to use, store, reproduce, display, modify, transmit or distribute the data contained in this website without the explicit prior written permission of Fusion Media and/or the data provider. All intellectual property rights are reserved by the providers and/or the exchange providing the data contained in this website.
Fusion Media may be compensated by the advertisers that appear on the website, based on your interaction with the advertisements or advertisers.
© 2007-2024 - Fusion Media Limited. All Rights Reserved.