Last year, the British market became more dependent on the import of fruit and vegetables than in previous years, according to a report by the Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs.
Since 2010, more fruit and vegetables were imported every year. Last year, imports increased by 11 per cent to a value of 2.3 billion pound. The imported volume rose by 5.1 per cent. The fruit import rose by 4.4 per cent, slightly less than the vegetable import. The import value of the fruit amounted to 3.6 billion pound, an increase of 18 per cent. The majority of the import comes from Spain. That country is good for 33.1 per cent of import vegetables and 21.3 per cent of import fruit. Other major suppliers are the Netherlands, South Africa and Ireland.
However, exports (including re-export) also rose for both fruit and vegetables, 1.7 per cent more volume was exported than in 2015. The value of the vegetable export amounts to 109 million pound, 13 per cent more than in 2015. For fruit, the figures show an increase of 17 per cent, valued at 116 million pound. The volume increased by 9.3 per cent to 143,000 tonnes.