The numbers speak clearly: German households love their vegetables. In 2024, tomatoes topped the charts at 13.6 kg per household, followed by cucumbers (11.6 kg), carrots (9.8 kg), onions (8.4 kg), and peppers (7.7 kg). Of these top crops, three are grown in greenhouses. With Germany's weather being the main challenge for growers, greenhouses are a logical option to cultivate certain crops and avoid seasonality. However, despite the ever-present demand and plenty of opportunities to tackle one of the biggest EU markets, domestic production covers only a fraction of this demand. Is it then possible for German greenhouse growers to step up and increase their self-sufficiency when it comes to greenhouse crops?
"Germany is not that
big of a player in this space," says Michael Koch, head of horticulture at AMI. The Agrarmarkt Informations-Gesellschaft (AMI) serves as a key market intelligence provider, offering data and insights across the entire supply chain - from primary producers to retail and consumer behavior. "Local tomato production covers only 12% of the demand, which means that 88% is coming from imports. For cucumbers, we are looking at around 10% grown in Germany, with 90% imports. Peppers are even lower than that, with only 4% produced locally and 96% imported."
German flag on produce
The first thing that comes to mind is whether there's any distinction between imported produce and locally produced goods in the market, to encourage German consumers to buy local. "German produce is clearly marked by a label - there's almost too much of that, even. There are some consumers who specifically look for locally grown vegetables, even if it's a bit more expensive." At the same time, this behavior clashes with the reality of the current situation. Michael points out that with the recent increase in food prices and the overall cost of living, consumers have become more price-sensitive. In other words, for the majority of consumers, it doesn't ultimately matter how many or which labels you put on a vegetable - price remains the main driver of purchasing habits.
There are differences between consumers in Germany and the UK, for instance, Michael says. He is very much aware that a UK flag label on produce would make consumers go for that - something that doesn't really work in Germany. "It also depends on how this difference is handled at the retail level, how stores market that. In Germany, everything is on the same shelf, local and imported. So, people are more inclined to decide based on price and not the German flag."
However, whether consumers get local or imported produce follows seasonal patterns. "During the winter months, imported produce is more expensive than during the summer," Michael points out. When local and foreign production overlap, there's not that much of a difference in prices. "Cucumbers, for instance, went for 1.80 euros per piece during January and February. This was roughly the same price for local and imported produce. If you look at summer 2024, consumers bought imported cucumbers for around 61 cents per piece, and it was 64 cents for German produce." This example shows that there's really no big gap in prices between local and imported produce in certain periods of the year. However, this also goes the other way around. "During March of this year, there was a significant price difference between local and imported tomatoes on the vine. Imported went for 2.20 euros per kg, and German ones went for 3.14 euros per kg." So while seasonality plays an important role in prices, there's also a certain degree of crop specificity that causes prices to go up or down.
Strawberries driving CEA adoption
Beyond the most consumed crops, there are other greenhouse crops that meet a higher demand percentage. "There's a split in the market for strawberries. Fifty percent of them are imported, fifty percent are produced locally. This is mainly because strawberries are still a seasonal crop in Germany. Some consumers then wait for the German ones, considering there's still a gap between the import season and the German season. For instance, right now, there are Spanish strawberries in the market, and in April, it's time for German strawberries. In a matter of two weeks, there's a complete switch in the market between imported and local strawberries."
Strawberries are a crop that is driving CEA adoption by growers, with open field production going down and greenhouses and plastic tunnels increasing. "Growers do this to increase the quality of the berries and improve work conditions for employees, allowing them to earn more money because of the shorter harvest times." There are, however, some factors that are slowing down the adoption rate of CEA, and labor is one of the main ones. "Right now, there's a shortage of labor coupled with rising costs due to minimum wage, which is currently under discussion to be raised even further - this is quite the challenge for the horticultural sector. Another factor slowing down CEA is the rising cost of steel and plastic resources needed to set up greenhouses and such."
On top of all that, there's the usual increase in costs coming from inputs such as fertilizers, fuels, and so on. "But there's also an issue with crop protection solutions," Michael remarks. "Germany has quite stringent regulations on this, and not many products are allowed. Unlike other countries in the EU, where growers can use more crop protection solutions to defend their crops from pests and pathogens. It goes without saying that competing with that is extremely difficult for German growers. I believe there's a need for a univocal and harmonized crop protection regulatory framework for all growers in the EU to level the competitive playing field for everybody." On top of all this, there are climate change-related challenges that make this crop protection argument even more compelling. "Last year, we saw a sharp increase in the risk of fungal diseases and other types of pests. For instance, last fall, there was a huge problem in lettuce due to a big uptick in aphids caused by weather conditions and the lack of proper crop protection solutions available. This meant that big retailers had to switch to imported lettuce earlier, and German growers had fewer opportunities to market their product in the end."
Even though Germany is the biggest market in Europe for greenhouse-grown produce, most of it is imported, and local production will hardly be able to meet a large chunk of the demand in the coming years. "Compared to Spain or the Netherlands, the total hectares of protected cultivation in Germany is much, much smaller. In 2024, there were a total of around 1,240 hectares of protected cropping operations, with tomatoes leading at 385 hectares. I believe there's no way for Germany, say, in the next 4–5 years to become a big player in greenhouse crop production. Setting up a facility is too expensive, you need to find the right place, go through German bureaucracy, and so on. There were some plans for greenhouses to be set up, but none of them have materialized as far as I know, and it's still a question whether they even will in the next few years." With rampant climate change, however, there may be a slightly higher level of self-sufficiency for some crops, as weather may become more favorable. "There are opportunities in peppers, and some producers have been talking about eggplants - one of the crops where we could actually reach a higher rate of self-sufficiency. And who knows, if weather conditions improve, there may be a chance for sugar melons too," Michael concludes.
This article was previously published in Primeur May 2025. Click here for the link to the entire edition
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