Is the extra 50p because they English Tomatoes?

Nirvana9

Price increases like that happen all the time in supermarkets. It's quite unbelievable but they hold all the power now so they will do what they like.

Nirvana9

brokenant wrote: »

Back to the point, It gets me every time that even when in season most things in England are more expensive than imported foreign produce. I buy wholesale and at the moment 6kg of tomatoes costs me £6 for Spanish or £11 for local, go figure.

It is unbelievable really isn't it?

Why do, for instance, bananas cost less than apples when apples can be grown right here and bananas have to come from far away?

And why oh why were the apples I bought the other day from New Zealand?! How is that necessary?!

FOXY1

I know a farm where the owners also had a golf club on the same site. The club actually buys potatoes from a local small business even though there main produce is potatoes! I asked why and it is because they can sell from their farm to the chip manufacturer for a higher price. Seemed madness but the chip company wants fresher products so will buy in britain, the potatoes bought in are foreign but not as fresh. Moral is if you want fresh you have to pay for it.

Andy_L

Nirvana9 wrote: »

Why do, for instance, bananas cost less than apples when apples can be grown right here and bananas have to come from far away?

The people who grow & harvest bananas are paid pence & the land is cheap. Whilst UK growers are, comparatively, expensive, and land is dear.
Both will still have the same sort of distribution costs within the UK (either from the orchard or the port), however sea transport is cheap &, when shipping in bulk, less than the extra cost of UK labour. Thus bananas are cheaper than apples

julie2710

I think the whole import/export, local thing is madness. I would love to be able to buy English produce all the time but the reality of it is I'm a working single parent on a very tight budget and I do encourage my boys to eat fruit and vegetables, which luckily they don't need too much persuading to do. That unfortunately means that my shopping bills tend to be higher than if I was buying the cheap processed junk in the supermarkets. It also means that if I am getting through 4 or 5 trays of tomatoes a week and there is a 75p difference per tray if I buy Spanish rather than English then I'm afraid the Spanish ones will get my money!

Maybe as a country we should stop this ludicrous shipping miles to pack thing then selling at higher prices than we can get from the other side of the world.

I seem to remember seeing something about imported potatoes being grown in Egypt of all places. The had set up some massive irregation system in the middle of the desert and were growing potatoes to import cheaply to the UK! Sort of says it all!!!

hcb42

fluffnutter wrote: »

I'd pay an extra couple of quid a week to ensure that the money goes to British suppliers.

So would I.

Nirvana9 wrote: »

It is unbelievable really isn't it?

Why do, for instance, bananas cost less than apples when apples can be grown right here and bananas have to come from far away?

And why oh why were the apples I bought the other day from New Zealand?! How is that necessary?!

Hmm.

Nirvana9 wrote: »

Price increases like that happen all the time in supermarkets. It's quite unbelievable but they hold all the power now so they will do what they like.

They dont hold all the power .You can vote with your feet.

I guess one reason is we have minimum wage here and health and safety legislation which protects our workforce, versus slave labour in tropical lands where a lot of fruit and veg and coffee etc is grown.

supermarkets also have vast buying power, which they use inappropriately on suppliers, which often makes trading for suppliers very difficult indeed.