BREXIT is to blame for conditions that caused a Scottish blueberry farmer to donate his £3 million crop to charity, according to an SNP MP.
Peter Thomson, who has around 60 acres of blueberry bushes on his farm in Blairgowrie, announced that it was no longer economically worthwhile for him to harvest the crop due to the value of the fruit falling by around £1 million this year.
Instead, he has invited local charities come to his farm and pick the fruit themselves so that it does not go to waste.
In an interview on BBC’s Landward, Thomson said that the cost of growing and distributing the fruit was no longer financially viable due to competition from imported producers.
However, Perthshire MP Pete Wishart said that Brexit has resulted in “cheap imports” being prized above home-grown produce.
He said: “While Peter Thomson should be commended for donating his blueberry crop to local charities rather than let it go to waste, the sad reality is that this is only happening because of post-Brexit Britain’s senseless trade pursuits.
“In the UK Government’s desperate scramble to secure haphazard trade deals with countries thousands of miles away, they have prioritised cheap imports, while quite literally leaving our own farmers’ high quality produce to rot. This insane race to the bottom is now an existential threat to our indigenous industries.
“I will be raising Peter’s situation in the ‘Food Security’ debate in Parliament later today, and will urge the UK Government to change tack or face hearing many more stories like this from farmers across the country.”
The Scottish blueberry crop was formerly prized because they were ripe at a time when the fruit was not yet ready for harvest in other countries.
But advancements in genetics technology now means that countries like Peru and South Africa are able to grow the fruit year-round.
Thomson also said that his farm was hamstrung by the low cost of labour in other countries, claiming that “the labour in these countries costs a tenth of what it costs here and we can't compete.”
In recent years, Perthshire’s soft fruit industry has undergone a recruitment crisis as farmers struggled to find enough seasonal labour to meet demand, with many blaming the impact of Brexit.
