Shortages on herb market because of bad weather in Spain

Bad weather in Spain is currently having many consequences for the herb supply on the market. “We cultivate mint and coriander in Spain. The mint grows on slopes, and water streamed down those in the past week. It was a few days before the ground could be walked on again. Because of that, we could not harvest for a few days, resulting in shortages on the market,” says Piet van Vugt of Van Vugt Kruiden from Ridderkerk, the Netherlands.

“It is not that production was lost in Spain, and the herbs will definitely be able to recover, but it is causing unrest on the market. This results in sky-high prices for these herbs. That does not have much influence on us, because we have plenty of our own production. It is important that the customer receives what they order,” Van Vugt says. “It will be very busy again in the coming weeks. Thanks to a good spread in the cultivation locations, we expect to meet all demand before Christmas again.”

The horticulturalist from Ridderkerk started packing and supplying herbs from his own greenhouse directly to retail and (catering) wholesalers throughout Europe more than fifteen years ago. Van Vugt happily looks back on 2016. “Regarding the weather circumstances, we experienced everything that could go wrong, from a wet July to a warm September. Fortunately, our customers did not much notice that. Our sales are nicely divided between catering and retail, and the latter group mostly buys small packaging.”

Van Vugt is also facing 2017 with confidence. “Our customers appreciate that we do our own cultivation, and that they can buy directly from the source. We experienced a significant increase particularly with mint and coriander last year, and that could also be said for leaf parsley.”