Christmas dinner might not be the same this year, as the UK is hit with a shortage of festive staples. UK farmers have been struggling all year with various storms affecting crops, which has led to one of the toughest harvests on record.
The UK’s potato crop is expected to plummet to record lows - just 4.1m tonnes, with retailers forced to rely on supplies in cold storage, reports The Sun. Shoppers are being warned to expect empty shelves after the last harvest of broccoli and cauliflower were also badly affected. Other favourites such as sprouts and parsnips have also been badly affected but are expected to bounce back enough to reach plates.
Following the battering from Storm Ciaran, Babet and Agnes, farms have been flooded with high levels of rainfall. The waterlogged ground has made it nearly impossible to grow enough vegetables for Christmas demand.
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UK farmer, Martin Tate manages 18,000 acres of land in the Lincolnshire. They said: "There won't be enough broccoli to supply the Christmas dinner demand. There is a nationwide shortage of broccoli, in fact, there's a European-wide shortage.
"Cauliflower is still a problem, and you can expect to see empty trays over the next few weeks but may return to normal before Christmas. After some initial issues, brussels sprouts supplies look like they will be okay."
However, Brits are being told that supermarkets have enough to supply for the festive period. Director of food and sustainability for the British Retail Consortium (BRC), Andrew Opie said: “High rainfall has created challenging conditions for farmers in the UK, however, food retailers are adept at managing disruption and have all the vegetables, potatoes and other festive foods households need for a great Christmas."
The news of the record low crop yield comes just weeks after reports suggested that duck and other game birds were at risk of being missed this Christmas. These seasonal favourites have faced an epidemic as trained and skilled staff who can process the animals have become harder to find.
About 55 million pheasants and partridges, plus 2.6 million mallard ducks are reared each year in captivity before being released into the wild. They are then shot for sport before being processed for food.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has released a review of labour shortages in the food supply chain. Last year, 600,000 of the 1.3million free-range birds available had been lost to disease, according to the British Poultry Council.
Retailers were granted permission by DEFRA to slaughter birds earlier than usual and then thaw them out in the run up to Christmas. It means that these birds were being sold as "defrosted", rather than fresh, according to the British Retail Consortium.
