The UK’s record-breaking summer has driven up the cost of fruit and vegetables and could feed into higher prices over the next year, as farmers contend with lower yields, depleted water supplies and rising production costs.
The average mean temperature across June, July and August reached 16.5C, according to the Met Office, exceeding the previous summer record of 16.1C set in 2025.
The prolonged heat and lack of rainfall have disrupted crop growth, forcing growers to divert scarce water to keep plants alive rather than maximise yields. Industry figures warn that the effects of this summer’s growing conditions could become more pronounced as later-season crops reach retailers.
William Thorogood, director of Rushton’s Green Grocer, a London-based wholesale fruit and vegetable supplier founded in 1997, said the full effect of the disruption had yet to be reflected in prices.
“Pricing has been an issue in the last couple of months but the effect is really going to be in the next 12 months. That’s going to be more of an issue as products like potatoes and onions for next year are going to be more expensive, the Express reported.
Brassicas, including cauliflowers and broccoli, have been among the crops most affected by reduced availability.
“Cauliflowers could have been 50p or 60p each but they went up to £3 which is quite a jump. There’s always some volatility but that is fairly extreme.”
Thorogood expects potatoes and other staple vegetables to become “more expensive at Christmas time”, as the impact of the summer’s growing conditions works through the supply chain.
“The issue this summer has been the heat. Growers have had to use a lot of water to keep things alive rather than keep them growing,” he said.
“When it gets super hot, things just stop growing, so you’re watering them to stop them from wilting and dying. From a water perspective, things need water to grow, and if it’s not raining, then you have to do that manually, which is very expensive, and the majority of farmers don’t have the reserves to put on enough water for this prolonged period of drought. This means that yields have been significantly lower and the sizes of crops, like potatoes, are a lot smaller.”
The disruption could expose a structural weakness in the UK’s food supply chain. Britain imports about 80 per cent of its fruit and 47 per cent of its vegetables, leaving retailers dependent on overseas producers when domestic supplies fall short.
Thorogood said that while imports provided an important buffer, the difficulties faced by domestic growers highlighted the longer-term pressures on British horticulture.
“We import a lot as a country, but as a company we specialise in quality British produce from UK growers. It’s certainly an industry in decline from that point of view.”
He warned that a mismatch between the end of the UK growing season and the arrival of produce from southern European and North African suppliers could create further shortages.
“The issue is going to be where produce is further ahead than it normally is at this time of year, and where people don’t have the water that they would usually expect to have at this time of the year in reservoirs, there could be a gap between where the UK produce is finishing early, which will impact supply.
“A lot of the supply now moves to Spain, Morocco and Italy and places like that, and there could be a gap between the UK finishing and them starting.”
The British Growers Association is calling for greater investment in water storage, including the expansion of farm reservoirs, arguing that improved infrastructure would help the agricultural sector adapt to increasingly volatile weather conditions.
John Walgate, chief executive of the British Growers Association, said: “We have enough water in the UK with winter rainfall, it’s all about how we store and use it. What we need is more winter storage, easier planning and licences to fill on-farm reservoirs. This will also help alleviate winter flooding’.”
The association has warned that consumers could see “gaps on shelves more often” unless the industry is better equipped to manage increasingly erratic weather.
Its argument is that increasing water storage would allow growers to make better use of rainfall during wetter months and protect production during prolonged periods of heat and drought.
During season British horticultural growers across the country work hard to consistently deliver delicious fresh fruit and vegetables to our retail shelves to ensure consumers have access to availability of a whole range of crops.
“This is no small task. It’s not about having a million lettuces one week and none the next. It’s about carefully managing crops to ensure a constant supply to meet demand week in week out.
“While the extreme hot weather and lack of rain might be good news for some, it brings about considerable challenges for our growers. Crops need water, and without it we see plants becoming dormant, heat-stressed and smaller in size and yield.”
For consumers, the immediate effect is likely to be felt through individual products rather than a uniform increase across the fruit and vegetable aisle. But the experience of the 2026 growing season has highlighted the growing economic cost of extreme weather — and the potential for water shortages to become a more persistent source of food-price volatility.
Leave a Comment