Quality of Spanish products mediocre

This week Peter Damen, Quality Specialist from KCB, saw many products from Spain. He mostly saw fruits and vegetables that are also grown here in the Netherlands. Peter's impression of the Spanish product was that overall the quality was good, but there were some places where the quality fell down.

There were still many tomatoes from the Netherlands but I also saw Spanish tomatoes. The quality of tomatoes from both countries was good, but the stems of the vine tomatoes were not always fresh. In a batch of beefsteak tomatoes I saw open lesions on the stem, which were mostly dry expect for one area. This one area was rotten. I found the bell peppers from Spain to be mediocre. The large size (90-110) had so many flaws that I had enough material for instruction in no time.

However, the Spanish iceberg lettuce was of very good quality. Large, compact heads of lettuce with 10 to a box. Across from this I saw a poor batch of Dutch lettuce with too many loose leaves. Dutch Chinese cabbage, bok choy and leeks were of good quality; which gives us the edge in the competition. A batch of large greenhouse grown Dutch lettuce was of good quality, as was a batch of endive.

Overall, from the companies I visited, I saw more Spanish products than Dutch. The Spanish greenhouse products were mediocre but the Dutch outdoor grown vegetables looked great.

Peter Damen
Quality Specialist KCB