Firebreak lockdown a Halloween nightmare for growers
THE Welsh Government’s twoweek firebreak lockdown has dealt a devastating blow to the country’s pumpkin farmers, who have been forced to close at the peak of their season.
The lockdown, introduced last Friday, means all non-essential businesses must close their doors to the public for 17 days.
And for farmers who have spent months growing pumpkins in time for Halloween, the impact is devastating.
Edward Kinder, director of Pumpkin Picking Cardiff, said they have planted more than 50,000 pumpkins this year on the 13-acre site.
The pick-your-own event takes months of planning, with planting taking place at the end of May. It then operates for just a few weeks each year in the run up to Halloween.
Mr Kinder said: “It’s only a short season over the Halloween period anyway so our main period of trading would have been from Friday, October 23 to October 31.”
As families often travel from all over to visit during half-term, he said the business would have done 75% of its sales in that time.
But the firebreak has ended the selling season in one fell swoop.
Commenting on the financial impact of the firebreak, Mr Kinder said: “It’s completely wiped it out. Doesn’t need any more saying than that, does it? It’s a failure.
“We’ve got six months of hard work that we’ve put into the event and, basically, it’s now been cancelled, so we’re feeling pretty upset about it, as you can imagine.”
It’s the second blow of the season for Pumpkin Picking Cardiff, which was already forced to comply with local lockdown restrictions imposed earlier in the month.
The patch is located just over the Cardiff county border in the Vale of Glamorgan.
But both counties have been under local lockdown restrictions, meaning people cannot travel to or from them without a reasonable excuse – such as for work, or caring duties.
This effectively meant that none of Cardiff’s 350,000 residents could visit the site.
Out of options for selling this year, Mr Kinder said the farm plans to feed its thousands of remaining sheep.
“They will have a feast,” he said. The farm is just one of many in Wales facing similar hurdles this year.
Rob Morgan, a fifth-generation farmer at Poundffald Farm in Swansea, said his family farm is only in its third year of growing pumpkins.
And the coronavirus pandemic has wrecked the large-scale event he planned this year.
“We’ve had to pull the plug on it,” he said, adding that he’s already spent thousands of pounds hiring costumed actors as part of the event.
Pumpkins amount to around 20% of the farm’s sales, though Christmas is the main income driver for the business.
For years, Poundffald Farm has grown and sold fresh Christmas trees, but Mr Morgan worries his most important season could be snarled by fresh restrictions.
“We’ve put all our eggs in one basket to do Christmas trees and pumpkins,” he said.
“It’s going to have a huge impact for us.”
Last Christmas, the farm began working with a delivery company to deliver trees to customers within 48 hours.
“If it does come to a lockdown, then that will be the way forward,” he said. pumpkins to their