Shortages lead to increased lettuce prices in Canada

Lettuce has been increasingly harder to find in Canadian supermarkets lately. Mohammad Nazari, the purchasing and sales manager at J.E. Russell Produce, a large Toronto-based produce distributor, says the prices of all kinds of lettuce – romaine, iceberg, red leaf and even packaged salads -- are up because of low supplies from California.

Nazari says the main reason for the shortage was due to the heavy rain which has been hitting California this season. The storms that flooded once-drought-stricken California as well as Arizona in January and February, wiped out many lettuce crops already in the ground, forced planting delays in the north, or led to problems with pests.

“With all the rains they’ve had, there have been issues with quality, with leaf lettuce having bugs and mildew because of all the moisture,” Nazari told CTVNews.ca by phone Monday.

"They’re not shipping it out if it has quality issues. So it’s created a real, real shortage that has been building and going on for about a month and half now,” he added.

“And now, prices are crazy. Romaine in the store should be selling for like, $2.99 at most; now, it’s as much as $4.99,” he said.

source: ctvnews.ca