
In Veg: It is a very good week for potatoes! This week, we have both brushed potatoes and 2kg packs of washed, red potatoes across our stores; both excellent quality, and at an excellent price. The shortage of tomatoes continues to be a problem, caused by the absence of backpackers who our industry relies on at harvest time for all of our fruit and vegetables. I can only see this situation worsening until our borders open up again. So, again this week, the truss tomatoes are the best value proposition in the tomato category. Snacking tomatoes are still good value; both these and the truss come from huge glasshouse suppliers, where the other tomatoes, affected by labour shortages, come off family farms who rely on seasonal labour. Kale has dipped in price this week and telegraph cucumbers and broccolini are still inexpensive and good value.
In Fruit: As Summer approaches, our industry starts to focus on stone fruit. Lychees are still dear, however the market is weakening. Cherries are not enjoying the rain in the growing areas, however there are some acceptable nectarines and peaches available, in fact the Imperfect and smaller nectarines are quite good. Grapes are still not to my taste, but they will get better every week. Honey Gold mangoes are absolutely outstanding. They are the only mangoes for me over the next week or more, as we wait for the Queensland fruit to mature. Papaya is very well priced this week, and bananas are falling in price as they do when stone fruit sales take over. Topless pineapples are very good value, and we are seeing limes ease in price, as lemons increase in price; limes will soon be better value than lemons! All we need now is some warm weather in both the growing areas and where the customers reside.