Greenhouses as far as the eye can see!
This, unfortunately, is where most of our fruit and vegetables comes from these days. Everything is grown under an ocean of plastic. The manual work involved is carried out mostly by illegal immigrants from N Africa.
Almeria is on the south-eastern tip of S Spain; just a short Mediterranean swim from both Algeria and Morocco. It has a climate that is perfect for growing almost anything.
The very worst Almeria-grown product that I've ever tasted was Asparagus. It was totally devoid of any flavour whatsoever. As you can imagine, I bought it without having read the country of origin.
I suspect we'll be seeing a lot more Almeria-grown products on our supermarket shelves before too long. With our farmers facing politically imposed difficulties, less will be home-grown, and more imported.
Back in 1985 (I think), Brussels were paying English Apple growers to 'grub-up' their orchards, and huge acreages were lost; the result being all those tasteless Apples coming from Spain.
We do seem to be shooting ourselves in the foot here in the UK, I would have thought it far more sensible for our government to encourage fruit and veg' growing on home soil, rather than forcing farmers to leave their farms. It just doesn't make sense.
I'm afraid that on Monday I grabbed a pack of Sprouts, whilst trying to avoid the crowds, never imagining that they would NOT be English-grown. When preparing them on Christmas morning I noticed that they came from The Netherlands. Oh dear! I really must pay more attention.
Meanwhile those horticulturists in Almeria must be rubbing their hands in glee; their futures look very rosy indeed!
I had not heard of Almeria and hope New Zealand doesn't import from there. Most of our fruit and vegies are either home grown or grown in Northland. A small amount such as the cherries I am enjoying at the moment are from the South Island. Very rarely Australia or the U.S.A.
ReplyDeleteThe more NZ can grow her own produce, the better you'll be. I simply cannot understand why we import so much stuff that we could easily grow here.
DeleteI was given advice from a Tesco worker, if you look for “the finest” they are mostly UK grown
ReplyDeleteI think all UK grown produce should have a large Union Flag on the label.
DeleteThat looks absolutely horrendous, all that plastic. And just imagine how much water they must have to use, because they're not going to get any rainfall under there. We're lucky here in Norfolk, we can usually find those sprouting stalks and if you leave them outside in a vase of water they last for ages. However, this year, Mr Asda delivered me some frozen ones and they really were lovely and sweet (and I don't actually like sprouts!) but you inspired me to read the label, which said 'freshly frozen and packed in Belgium'...Your bag of sprouts look a bit past it to be honest!
ReplyDeleteI believe that they all have their own water wells underneath the plastic. Those sprouts were probably picked two weeks before Christmas, and were looking a bit tired. They tasted OK.
DeleteUnfortunately, the most profitable crop that UK farmers can grow, in our crazy world, is solar panels. The returns from taxpayer (i.e. you and I) subsidy far outweigh the returns from conventional farming, don't require expensive and soon to be banned fertilizer or Boaver fed to the dairy herd.....
ReplyDeleteThe English countryside will soon resemble this, but with solar panels replacing polytunnels.
And, of course, an area the size of Surrey built-over with housing that people can't afford (or need).
DeleteThere is a huge water problem in Almeria and as well as an environmental one. A blind eye is turned to cheap labour paid under minimum wage so they continue to have workers. The EU was never a level playing field.
ReplyDeleteI believe they all dig their own wells. How much water is there is anyone's guess.
DeleteI was watching a documentary about the area very recently and the water problem is as I said, huge. There is not enough water to go round and ancient wells and channels are now dry and have been misused. The whole population of the region is suffering because of the misuse, not just the greenhouse area.
DeleteThat doesn't surprise me at all. Cramming all those greenhouses into such a small area isn't natural or sustaining.
DeleteI must admit that I thought your aerial picture of Almeria was a fake one so I went to Google Maps imagery to check. I am sorry that I doubted you because I spotted a vast area in the Almeria region that is pretty much all glasshouses. The town of San Agustin has no proper countryside around it - only glasshouses.
ReplyDeleteGood for their economy; disaster for the world. Just looking at the photo fills me with horror.
DeleteI've heard a put those glasshouses and the food they grow. Couldn't imagine how huge an area they cover. I don't think we get any produce from there thank goodness. Most of our fresh vegetables and fruit are Greek, so they so. But I have seen Turkish and South African lemons.
ReplyDeleteWe all need to read the labels
Above all we should all support our own economies. If we don't, then we can't complain.
DeleteLook up farmwashing - the tricks used by supermarkets to disguise country of origin. I posted about this a few weeks ago (Nov 24th). We do have some of our vegetables delivered from Riverford, which is mostly UK and all ethically sourced, but unfortunately not the cheapest.
ReplyDeleteThis post was triggered by a pack of Tesco Carrots I saw that were called ENGLISH CARROTS, but the smaller label said that they came from Spain.
DeleteThat's appalling and bordering on the illegal. But unless we stop accepting the bribery of cheap goods and services it will continue, and get worse.
DeleteWhen we were in southeastern France last summer, we rented a Gite, in the middle of 70 acres of greenhouses,
ReplyDeleteWhilst in S W France farmers are paid to do nothing, with all that fertile land remaining unused. It's a scandal.
DeleteA pound to a penny the greenhouses have C02 generators in them. Yet governments are desperate to deny us anything that generates carbon dioxide. Generating C02 in China seems to be fine. It's all a load of bollocks. Little wonder folk like working for governments who demand little for the paycheck other than subservience to their narrative.
ReplyDeleteIt's unsustainable, as is having anything above 10% of the working population employed by the state. When did you ever hear of folk looking for employees saying. " I know. Lets poach a state employee."
And I believe that a brand new Quango has been established every week since the present lot came to power. They do love their bureaucrats.
DeleteI was poached by a computer company from a university, and I know of others similar.
DeleteMy wife worked in personal tax, and her employer refused point blank to ever consider taking on an ex Inland Revenue candidate. He claimed that they had absolutely no grasp of any kind of service to clients.
DeleteAre we surprised Will?
Delete