Europe’s fresh food supply is being threatened by coronavirus

Farmers sorting snow peas at a collection center at Mirangine, Nakuru County on February 28, 2020. [Caroline Chebet, Standard]

Fresh fruit and vegetables will become increasingly scarce in Europe, suppliers warn, as the coronavirus pandemic hampers the global movement of produce and of the people needed to gather crops.

Governments are looking at ways to ease any shortage, including ‘green lanes’ to allow fresh produce to move quickly across EU borders, recruiting a ‘shadow army’ of harvesters and loosening travel rules for migrant workers.

While Europe’s supermarkets say they are still getting most produce, supply pressures are building at source, including in Africa, a key provider of fresh goods, and within Europe.

Stores that are already dealing with hoarding by customers may struggle to keep shelves stocked.

In Kenya, a major supplier of green beans and peas to Europe, half of the workers in the sector have been sent home on mandatory leave because of the industry’s inability to ship orders, even as demand from European retailers surge.

“Their (European) stocks are being depleted by the day,” said Okisegere Ojepat, chief executive of the Fresh Produce Consortium of Kenya which groups over 200 growers and exporters.

Shipments from another key supplier, South Africa, are becoming more challenging with the country ordering a 21-day lockdown.

“We were in reasonably good shape until earlier this week but now things are becoming very difficult,” said Hans Muylaert-Gelein, managing director at Fruits Unlimited, a South Africa-based company that exports fruits and vegetables to the UK.

“More and more flights are being grounded so I expect there are going to be big disruptions.”

Those planes that are flying are charging more. Operators have tripled the price per kilo of produce to $3 (Sh315) in the past two weeks, said Hosea Machuki, head of the Fresh Produce Exporters Association of Kenya representing 117 growers and exporters.

Western supply chains are buckling as problems ranging from a shortage of truck drivers to restrictions on seafarers hit the smooth flow of goods, freight logistics operators say.

Even longer-lasting produce like citrus fruit, which is normally transported by sea, could be stranded because of the shortage of containers linked to China’s shutdown, said Muylaert-Gelein.

“Oranges and lemons, the old ambassadors of vitamin C, are in high demand. Also roots, carrots, cabbages, anything that has health properties people have stocked up on,” he told Reuters.

A shortage of migrant workers also threatens to disrupt production in several top European suppliers including Spain, the biggest exporter of fruit and vegetables in the EU.

Some 16,000 Moroccan seasonal workers, mostly women, were expected to arrive in the Huelva region in Spain to pick strawberries and red fruits under an agreement between the two countries.

Closed borders

Less than half had made it by March 12, as Morocco closed its borders to passenger traffic, said Abdelmounaïm Madani, head of the Moroccan job promotion agency ANAPEC. The country’s lockdown is due to last until April 20.

Farmers and unions in Spain said the production, processing and export of fruit and vegetables was still going smoothly, although the state of emergency is restricting people’s access to farms and packing areas.

Absentee rates were as high as 50 per cent in recent days, said agricultural worker union representative Monica Vega.

Philippe Binard, general delegate of Freshfel Europe, which represents Europe’s fresh produce industry, said the main problem was the lack of seasonal workers, especially for labour-intensive crops like strawberries and asparagus.

The challenges included moving workers from accommodation to farms while maintaining social distancing.

“Before they were collected in a minivan of eight or nine people and then worked the day and then moved back. Now these collective transports are no longer possible.”

Mr Binard said supermarkets may move towards selling produce which could be more easily mechanised in the supply chain.

Heinz Schibli runs a farm growing strawberries, raspberries and blackberries in the rolling countryside just south of the Rhine River near Winterthur, Switzerland. All of his crops are destined for the Swiss market.

Typically, he would now have about 30 workers from Slovakia, Romania and Poland working in his fields and greenhouse, either preparing the first strawberries of the season for harvest next month, or getting ready for the new round of planting.

By May, he will need 70 as harvest season begins in earnest. So far, only 12 harvest workers have arrived, as those due to come this week have been blocked either by restrictions in their own countries or on transiting Germany and Austria to get to Switzerland.

Given the uncertainty, Mr Schibli is talking with local authorities about enlisting local unemployed people or asylum seekers waiting for their cases to be resolved.

“The worst-case scenario is that we won’t be able to plant all the berries that we normally would after the first round is harvested, or that we wouldn’t even be able to do the actual harvest,” Schibli told Reuters.

The Swiss government on Wednesday announced 20 billion Swiss francs (Sh2.2 trillion) in no- or low-interest loans to help small businesses like Schibli’s make it through the coronavirus crisis should their income dry up.

In Germany, whose food sector relies on some 286,000 seasonal workers every year, the agriculture minister has talked with carrier Lufthansa to see if they could be flown in if they can prove they are not infected. Other ideas include temporarily easing the time limit for seasonal workers beyond the current 70 days.

France, where farmers forecast a shortage of around 200,000 labourers during the harvest period, has also appealed to newly laid-off workers to help pick fruit and vegetables.

The European Commission has urged the 27 EU countries to adopt measures to ensure free flow of freight along ‘green lanes’ with border crossings lasting under 15 minutes.