Scarcities

I do not think circumstances will be that bad, just that crops which are labour intensive to crop, mainly soft fruit and some vegetables will be in shorter supply, more expensive or replaced with imports.

Tinned asparagus is a completely different vegetable to fresh asparagus. Like tinned peaches and fresh peaches.

As Sainsburys only stocked Icing Sugar produced in France yesterday, I might have to find an alternative supermarket when I make cakes, or is all Icing Sugar now sourced from France?
What’s wrong with British sugar then?

I would stock up on nothing because we always have to adapt and move on to use what is available so I have no thoughts about it at all
Anyway Brexit has happened yet (?)

Oh really !

I really don’t think anybody needs to start panic buying!

If we have to import cabbages because the Norfolk farmers are forced out of business we will have to pay a lot more for simple cabbages, and potatoes and soft fruits, and apples and so on and so on.

/blogs.exeter.ac.uk/exeterblog/blog/2016/09/19/who-picked-british-fruit-and-veg-before-migrant-workers/

Asparagus is a luxury whichever way you look at it and nothing tinned is as good as home grown foodstuffs. Do you have a garden Alexa ? If not take a look at verticalveg.org.UK and be inspired! It is truly amazing how much food you can grow for yourself in a very small space. I am a great believer in positivity and doing what you can for yourself whenever possible. If it is survival you are thinking of I don't think that asparagus should even be on the list.

We don't have a huge garden and have used trees as our boundaries and grown as cordons. We have Damson, plum, greengage, morello cherries, apples of all kinds and pears. Over the tops of some of the cordon we have blackberries trained on wires. We have strawberries and blueberries in raised beds. We have a small greenhouse for tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers and two large raised beds for salad crops and vegetables like carrots and beetroot. We use other spaces to set down bags in which we grow space hungry stuff like potatoes, beans, courgettes etc. DDIL and DS grow madly too and have space for a big poly tunnel and keep bees as well. DD has a tiny garden and does 'square metre gardening' in raised beds. DS in a flat uses the balcony and window boxes and hangs containers on the wall and does really well with it all. Cousins all grow stuff in pots. We all freeze, bottle, jam, pickle and make chutney. We swap and do extra for each other whenever we can. It is really only the way in which we all used to live anyway and we eat well! We don't worry about food we just get on and grow it.

If the farmers cannot pick their labour intensive crops they will find other crops to grow, or farm machinery manufacturers will develop machinery that can pick the previously labour intensive crops. Cabbages are a classic example of a crop that it should be easy to crop mechanically and potatoes already are cropped by machine and not dug up by hand.

I think any shortage will be short term as suitable machinery will soon be developed. Many technological advances are the result of crises like the one you envisgae.

I will not be losing any sleep over it!

Absolutely MOnica! I was fascinated to watch the huge machines used to harvest cauliflowers. It moved over the field, cut the cauli, cut off the excess leaves and out of the back they came bagged and boxed and were taken off by the supermarket transport. Sure that cabbages will be done in the same way. No sleep lost in our family either! Have to say that home grown veg does have the edge though!

Am I alone in liking to buy fruit and veg in season? - remember the days when you could buy strawberry punnets by the roadside and it felt like the summer was finally here. I hate those nasty imported berries; no taste, no colour and wouldn't care if I had to pick my own from the farm.

Panic mongering.

Perhaps we will eat more British food and seasonally. I am all in favour of this. Hate to see strawberries at Xmas! I have always thought we should Support our local farmers and growers. The same with meat. I hate that danish pork is so much cheaper than our British pork. I only ever buy the British stuff but appreciate that not everyone can afford to do that.

Do you all remember years ago we had ‘Buy British’ posters and stickers on apples etc? Perhaps it’s time to start this mindset again.

Growing up we never had peppers, aubergines, courgettes, blueberries, six kinds of tomatoes etc I am sure we will manage, I never eat strawberries at Christmas ugh. We may however have to pay a little more for some items but the whole world apparently wants to do business with us so perhaps we will get used to some strange new foods - we are good at that.

It amuses me no end that people think the world will come to an end if we have to pay more for or cannot get certain foods. Born before the war I was brought up on rationing....and the nation was healthy....no obesity crisis. I can remember being totally confused as to what to do with a Banana after the war.

Where are the optimists in Gransnet?
Why look for trouble before trouble begins?
Too many scare stories flying around - wait and see!

I really do not believe farmers will be forced out of business.
We will still have migrant workers in the country, just as British citizens will still be working in Europe.
Britain is still an attractive prospect for migrants, they will just have fewer rights if they do not have work etc.
We somehow managed before the huge influx of migrants I’m sure we will cope again.

A very pessimistic post!

Migrant workers worked in the fields and greenhouses round here before we joined the European union, with no problems.

It will be the same when we leave!

First of all, don't believe all you read. Secondly, i may be wrong and please correct me if so, but we don't produce sugar do we? Surely the raw product is imported and then refined and made into various products.

They grow sugar beet in U.K. - some for cattle and some for refining. The only cane sugar is Tate and Lyle which is why it is often dearer as it needs to be imported.

I will not be stocking up on anything, I’m sure we won’t starve. When I first married, most fruits and vegetables were only available seasonally, and possibly this might happen again. However, if certain things are not as readily available, so be it.
The way things are going, it’s looking as though there won’t be much disruption to supplies anyway. It’s looking like the customs union is going to continue, and possibly even us staying in EEA, so I’m not going to get stewed up about not having enough asparagus, for example.

Surely you've got better things to worry about.
You can't make a lifetimes saving on soft fruits and cabbages and if they do go up in price it'll only be by pence .
If you can afford tinned asparagus there's no need to worry.
We've coped with much more than this and survived!