"In 45 years I've never experienced such a terrible, prolonged period for lettuce"

"I have been growing lettuce for 45 years and I have never seen lettuce this thin for this amount of time," says Henk van Doorne, lettuce grower and exporter in 's-Gravenzande, Netherlands. "Things have been difficult since the second week of December. It is not that we have too much supply. There are some growers who have no lettuce this year due to problems with fusarium, and the overproduction of other vegetables is not creating the best market conditions."

The price of poly lettuce is between 18 and 23 cents, "Small volumes are going to Ireland and the Middle East, but it is not enough. It is a real mess to try and sell all that has been produced. In the past, England was a good customer in the winter, but they are not so any longer. We are also missing the Russian market. Before the boycott we used to sell a trailer of lettuce to Russia once a week," says Henk.

Although the heating costs are lower this winter, Henk would have rather seen something else, "I don't mind the costs if we get a good price for the product. There are definitely shortages when it has frozen over. I would have liked to have given a more positive report, but that's just not possible right now. Now we have carnival and spring break, so I don't see a light at the end of the tunnel."