While the Horticulture Industry was worth €424m in 2015, according to the Department of Agriculture, the number of commercial growers is falling. Last year, the total farmgate value of the field vegetable sector was €67m.

There has been a continuous trend in the reduction of the number of fresh produce growers since the turn of the century. For example, the number of field vegetable growers fell from 377 in 1999 to 215 in 2009. It is anticipated that the 2015 National Field Vegetable Census will record a further fall and likely to show a drop of over 50% in the number of commercial growers since 1999.

“The overall age profile of the grower demographic indicates that there is an increasing need to encourage and attract new blood into the industry, in particular to inherit and maintain the existing growing skill within the industry,” said Lorcan Bourke, potato and vegetable manager in Bord Bia.

“In recent years the variability in the weather across the growing season has provided many challenges for growers. Where possible, investment has been directed at measures that will assist in minimising the impact of weather in some situations.”

It is not all doom and gloom, however. There are opportunities in food service with sliced, diced and prepared vegetables which add value to the end product.

“Irish people have become obsessed with health. Vegetables have never been more popular,” Bourke added. The top six field vegetable crops in terms of farmgate value are broccoli, cabbage, carrots, parsnips, swedes and scallions, which make up two-thirds of the farmgate value of the field veg sector.

It is estimated that 6,000 are employed full time in primary production activity in the horticulture sector, with a further 10,000 employed in downstream businesses.

Retail

Kantar figures show that vegetables make up €524m of the €1.248bn retail fresh produce market. But as a nation we are only consuming half the recommended five-a-day portions of fruit and vegetables an IUNA study found.

“The key market for local fresh produce is the retail market,” said Lorcan Bourke of Bord Bia, adding that the retail value of the vegetable segment of the market was up 1.5% over the last year while volume was up 1.2%.

“The key players in the retail market now have over a 90% share of this market between them. The market is competitive and demanding in terms of the quality, range, presentation and price.”

Concentration of retail buying power is a concern for growers, however, and the growth of private labels is “reducing the possibility for privately owned brands.”

Chair of the IFA National Field Vegetable and Protected Crops Committee Paul Brophy grows 700 acres of brassica crops in Naas, Co Kildare, employing over 80 people. He started the business 33 years ago on a mixed farm. The vegetable sector consolidated in the early noughties and Brophy said if it wasn’t for that he wouldn’t have survived when the big discounters came in. Supplying 55% of the Irish broccoli market, his project for this year is optimisation of acreage.

“I’m delusional if I think I’m going to take over the whole Irish market. I need those other Irish growers there to compete with rather than the big UK companies who would be only too happy to supply Ireland,” he admits.

Challenges

“The biggest problem in the vegetable sector is the lack of youth entering the industry,” he said. “I’m 53 years of age and I’m one of the youngest going to the IFA meetings. You’d worry about the skill set being lost, like the Irish sugar industry.”

Grant aid is “essential” for the vegetable sector as every grower faces the challenge of regulation. It is difficult to secure funding from banks who dislike the risk associated with such a specialised sector.

“Over-regulation would make you tear your hair out,” Brophy said.

“We need regulation but why have inspections from multiple government agencies when the sector is on its knees? We have a full-time quality assurance (QA) girl here but the cost of that is spread out over a big business. The cost of compliance is unaffordable for some growers that are under 50 acres. For the margin that’s in the business, smaller growers don’t have the turnover to invest in quality assurance.”

He suggests that inspections from the Department of agriculture and Bord Bia could be combined as one.

Labour

With 34% of the cost of production accounted for by labour, growers are very sensitive to changes in legislation surrounding the labour force.

“When the minimum wage increased last year I went to my customers to get an increase in price on the grounds that it was a cost outside of my control.”

Finding suitable staff can be difficult as it’s “not an ordinary Joe soap that sits up in a tractor with €30k to €40k of equipment in it”.

To recruit interested people, Brophy hosts university tours on the farm and has secured good staff as a result of that.

When retailers ask for costs of production, Brophy’s response is to direct them to the Teagasc figures which provide a guide, but depends upon economies of scale in many cases.

It is hard to estimate future costs because “it can cost twice as much to harvest a crop during wetter periods”.

Below-cost selling

The IFA held a number of protests this year outside supermarkets that were selling vegetables below the cost of production. Since then, the supermarkets went to visit 12 growers.

“It put a human face to the supermarkets. Growers have a channel now; if they are being played off they have a point of contact,” said Brophy.

“Discounts were never intended to become a promotional tool, they were a method of clearing excess stock. Below-cost selling distorts the market. When broccoli is on discount the guy producing cauliflower might as well go on holiday. When the discount is over the cauliflower is gone off and has to be thrown out.”