Tomatoes
New winter range claims to be first time LED technology has been used to expand British tomato season on commercial scale
Sainsbury’s has said it is the first major retailer to grow British tomatoes at this time of year using LED lights.
The UK’s third largest supermarket said it has extended the British tomato season with the largest range of UK-grown tomatoes available through the winter months.
Its new Taste the Difference winter range includes new yellow cherry tomato Sunglow, large vine tomato Jubilee, cherry tomato on the vine Vittoria, and a Best of British mixed colour cherry pack.
The news comes as Sainsbury’s continues to expand its British offering as part of its 20×20 Sustainability Plan, in which it pledged to double the amount of British food its sells by 2020.
Nigel Bartle, chairman of the British Tomato Growers Association said: “Growers have been working tirelessly hard both with researchers and Sainsbury’s to extend the season and this year thanks to LED technology will be able to produce more fresh British tomatoes than ever before.”
“This is the first time a large-scale commercial nursery has used this technology in the UK.”
Sainsbury’s product technologist, Melissa Jones, said: “By working closely with our growers we’ve been able to extend the British tomato season – which takes a lot of skill and investment from our growers.”
She said growers used a mixture of sodium and LED lights to help plants to grow and tomatoes to ripen.
“It’s important we offer British products when they taste their best and we know our customers care about buying British too. This range of tomatoes is another example of growing more of our favourite fruit and veg closer to home,” added Jones.
Growers claim the modifications effectively give Morocco free access to the European market
Spain has criticised a European Commission to reform the Entry Price System for tomatoes claiming it will cause significant harm to Spanish producers by clearing the way for a massive influx of Moroccan tomatoes during the peak of the Spanish season.
The Commission announced on Monday that it would modify the way it calculates entry prices to include cherry tomatoes, instead of just round tomatoes. The proposed change will raise the average entry price and effectively means that Morocco will be allowed to export to the EU tariff-free as the entry price at which point the tariff is activated will always be higher than the preferential price of €46.1 per 100kg.
Murcian exporter association Proexport accused the commission of caving in to pressure from Morocco and other non-EU countries and effectively given them free access to the European market.
“This decision is a disaster for Spain’s tomato producers and leaves us defenceless,” said José Hernández, president of Proexport and Fepex’s Tomato Committee. “This will bring about a new pricing crisis and provoke growers to abandon farms leading to significant job losses.”
The Spanish government has been calling for the Commission to apply the rules set out under article 4 of the Association Agreement between Morocco and the EU, which requires that exports from the African country are maintained at a stable level to avoid oversupply. It also called for the entry price to be raised in order to offset the effects of the changes to the method of calculating the entry price.
EU imports of Moroccan tomatoes have increased from 194,000 tonnes in 2004 to 369,000 tonnes last year.
A European Union official has announced plans to visit Morocco on April 23, following outrage in the North African nation over slated EU rules that would restrict produce exporters’ abilities to sell on consignment.
The new rules would give the European Commission the power to calculate fixed import values, as part of a change to the Entry Price System for Fruits and Vegetables that was agreed upon by the European Parliament on April 7, and put to discussion Monday by the Council of Europe. 
The Maghreb Arab Press (MAP) has reported the European Union Director General of Agriculture and Rural Development, Jerzy Plewa, has expressed his readiness to follow up on technical level discussions relating to the amendment.
Morocco’s Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Aziz Akhannouch, told the agency the decision to modify access price mechanisms for Moroccan fruits and vegetables in the EU was both “astonishing and incomprehensible”.
“Moving to modify the access price system for Moroccan fruits and vegetables is a step backward on the negotiations that mobilized for a long period of time Moroccan and European officials,” Akhannouch was quoted as saying.
“We were satisfied over the fairness and balance of the agreement [signed in February, 2012 between Morocco and the EU]. But this measure risks to disrupt the balance, because of an action that totally contradicts the agreed upon conditions.”
Agricultural consultant Hassan Benabderrazik told Medias24.com the new measures required exporters to use a “standard import value” for their produce, which would often be well below entry prices; a fact that would effectively penalize growers of high quality products like cherry tomatoes.
The consultant calculated the measure would immediately affect the tomato industry, with 30-50% of exports penalized by the new rules.
Akhannouch told MAP a relationship of confidence and sustainable partnership was being jeopardized, and that the move was a particular threat to Morocco’s tomato growers whose system was at risk of collapse under the new rules.
“We cannot even imagine the consequences on a Moroccan sector and operators which have invested and believed in serious outlets for fruits and vegetables,” he was quoted as saying.