Is Brexit a major cause of the current food shortgages in the UK?

Heine_Otto said:
Nothing to do with Brexit.
Apart from trade barriers meaning Fruit and Veg exporters in Europe are focussing more on Continental Europe rather than the UK, lack of pickers in the UK meaning we wasted massive stocks of our own produce last year, and lack of truck drivers to deliver the stuff.

Stocks are fine in Spain according to their farming according to the head of their farming organisation. Could be the weather and energy prices though 🤷‍♂️
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Dash it all man, are you saying Brexit means we can’t pay Johnny Foreigner peanuts to do our dirty work? I shall be having words at the Golf Club, you may be assured of that sir.
 
Nobby_Barnes said:
Hasn't been a problem until last week.....
Hmmm
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It has been a problem. While there's plenty of supply then Brexit factors simply make things slower and more expensive for the suppliers. Once supply starts to decrease then it preferentially goes to places that are cheaper and faster to supply. If UK importers want to get more of what is available they will have to pay through the nose to overcome the Brexit costs and that means hiking prices to British customers. UK importers, wholesalers and retailers know that UK consumers won't pay those prices so they don't import them.

At every stage in the process, Brexit makes trade with EU countries slower and more expensive for both sides. It even slows down trade with non-EU countries because all the red-tape that Brexit created for EU trade reduces our ability to process non-EU trade. We only have a limited amount of customs workers. That's the Brexit burden we all pay for.
 
Northern Ireland are benefitting because European trade comes through Eire. A trip on the train from Belfast or a ride out over the Border and you can get what you want. Its also moving the other way.(y)
 
Bruce said:
It has been a problem. While there's plenty of supply then Brexit factors simply make things slower and more expensive for the suppliers. Once supply starts to decrease then it preferentially goes to places that are cheaper and faster to supply. If UK importers want to get more of what is available they will have to pay through the nose to overcome the Brexit costs and that means hiking prices to British customers. UK importers, wholesalers and retailers know that UK consumers won't pay those prices so they don't import them.

At every stage in the process, Brexit makes trade with EU countries slower and more expensive for both sides. It even slows down trade with non-EU countries because all the red-tape that Brexit created for EU trade reduces our ability to process non-EU trade. We only have a limited amount of customs workers. That's the Brexit burden we all pay for.
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One of the many brexit burdens. Ignore Nob though. He's just a WUM. You won't get an intelligent response out of him on this subject
 
ThePrisoner said:
Yes me too.

I don't know where Corcaigh is shopping if he's not seeing empty shelves. There are empty shelves permanently in my local Morrisons and have been for at least a year. Bananas, eggs, turnips, melons, celery to name just a few have all been unavailable at one time or another. Tomatoes and cucumbers are just the most recent, more extreme, shortage. The UK is now in a state of permanent food shortages.

M&S near me had no tomatoes today either. They had some cucumbers at about 50% more cost than I usually buy at Morrisons. Mind you, that is the same for everything in M&S all the time.
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The Lidl(s) I shop in must just spread their wares around. Eggs are the only thing I've seen in short supply, not the fruit and veg we've been debating.
 
ThePrisoner said:
Maybe it's because they are German and have better EU supply lines.

I might bin Morrisons off and try them.
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They're handy for me, even handier now that another one has opened just up the road. They don't have the ranges you get a large supermarket, only a couple of brands of beans as opposed to an aisle full, but a good range of fruit, veg etc and some decent bread.
 
ThePrisoner said:
Maybe it's because they are German and have better EU supply lines.
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I have a brother who has lived in Germany for 45 years. He was genuinely surprised to hear about tomatoes, eggs etc here. So I sent him a pic from my local sainsburys in London this morning, which I happened to be in.

His comment?

"I can’t ever remember seeing an empty shelf of anything anywhere here .... Funnily enough I really like Turnips, you can’t get them everywhere here as they are generally used to feed cows"

I may do a swap.
 

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Redwurzel said:
BM there was empty shelves sometimes in the 1970s - I remember a run on sugar, sometimes shops were shut because they had no power. Tomatoes could only be bought in season (April to November). We are experiencing massive changes in energy prices and much more strikes and like now labour shortages, plus double digit inflation, that remind me of the 1970s, that were not experienced in the last 40 years.
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great, so the Tories have returned us to the bad old days of the 70s, they've really messed up the economy.
 
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