Environment Secretary, Liz Truss:
British summer fruits should be available all year round
Liz Truss said that producers could extend growing seasons to make their products more "compelling" to the British shopper. She pointed to the success of the strawberry industry which has introduced poly tunnels on a widespread scale so that "people can eat British strawberries virtually all year round."
This year fruit farms will still be picking British strawberries in December for the first time in history, after the long summer and mild autumn combined with such techniques to produce a record crop.
In total, the season, which started seven weeks early in March, was due to last 38 weeks, making it the longest ever.
Mrs Truss said that other producers should look to those "great examples" and "expand their competitiveness.
"In fact apart from price buying British is the number one factor cited by consumers because they know that it is a high quality product produced with high welfare standards and what I think as a government we can do is help improve things like labelling, help measures to help the industry more competitive, for example our agri-tech strategy but if you look at industries like poultry they have been very successful. “85 per cent of the chicken we eat is produced in Britain or the strawberry industry - they succeeded in lengthening their season through the use of things like poly tunnels so that people can eat British strawberries virtually all year round. Those are great examples that others can look to and expand their competitiveness.”
Source: telegraph.co.uk