Hold On To Your Lettuces! There's A Crisis Ahead
2017 is looking a little less green
Planning on having a nice salad with dinner later? You might want to read this first.
Supermarkets everywhere have been running low on the good green stuff, as another food staple falls victim to the 'crisis' of European vegetable shortages - The lettuce!
Many stores are rationing the leafy veg to a maximum of three per customer, with many empty shelves being plastered with a 28-days-later sign.
Read More: These New type Of Vegetable Yoghurts Are Just Sooo Waitrose!
Experts are warning that a failure in improved weather conditions could mean that the crisis could last as long as April!, with customers feeling the pinch in their wallets with price rises.
But the lettuce isn't the only veg to be left out in the cold.
Courgettes, salad peppers, broccoli and cabbage are also at risk of being cut short this season.
Healthy eaters and lettuce lovers have been sharing pictures and comments of the empty shelves and notices on Twitter.
Lettuce shortage in Europe as bad weather hits farms https://t.co/qQ9ogxbRbK pic.twitter.com/Br4jzIZQfq
— Deplorable DayVarela (@dayvarelat) February 3, 2017
#Google VOANews: Lettuce Shortage Hits Europe Due to Bad Weather https://t.co/fKUykCwFPS pic.twitter.com/8KORMJEATM
— Asif Pervez (@asifpervezphd) February 3, 2017
Forget Brexit. Forget Trump. There's a lettuce and broccoli shortage ravaging Europe. How will we cope?!
— Lane Swift (@LaneSwift) February 3, 2017
It could be May before a shortage of vegetables like lettuce, broccoli and courgettes improves. It's down to poor weather in Europe pic.twitter.com/hCtdVwDink
— Maria McCann (@journomaria) February 3, 2017
As Spain usually supplies most of our lettuce supplies during the colder months, Supermarkets have been forced to look further afield to the US West Coast which is more than 5,300 miles from Britain – to meet demand.
Coos Hessing, of Hessing Super Fresh, explained that the lettuce crisis was ‘particularly severe’.
‘There have simply been too many cold days, and what’s most bizarre about this situation is that it has hit all of south-eastern Europe.
‘We had seen this before, but you’d need to go back to 15 years ago,’ the buyer told industry site Fresh Plaza.
Supermarket chains such s Tescos and Morrisons have also been speaking up about the lettuce situation, with Tescos explaining that they were
‘experiencing some availability issues’ due to the bad weather in Spain but that they were working on resolving the issue "as quickly as possible,”
A Spokesman from Morrisons said:
As a result of the fact that the Spanish harvest has been very difficult this year, we have just about enough coming in to supply our customers.
‘We want to stop local tradespeople and restaurateurs coming in and buying lots of stock.’
Hopefully we get the green light lettuces soon.