Supermarkets’ berries ‘drain national park of its water’
THREE British supermarkets have been accused of buying soft fruit from suppliers who have helped drain a Portuguese region’s water supplies to a historic low, damaging its ecology.
Marks & Spencer, Waitrose and Tesco sell soft fruits, such as raspberries, blueberries and strawberries, grown in the Alentejo and Vicentine Coast National Park, which activists claim is being harmed by intensive agriculture.
The park encompasses a 100 mile (160km) stretch of the southern section of the country’s Atlantic coast. Its sunny weather makes it ideal for growing berries, and multinationals began operating in a government-designated farming zone there in 2005.
The farms grow crops in plastic greenhouses estimated to occupy 4,800 hectares of the park – five per cent of its area – and use water from the Mira river’s irrigation canals and from a lake at the Santa Clara dam, 25 miles ( 40km) inland. The area’s water authority said 90 per cent of the water supplied by its reservoirs is used for agriculture.
Campaigners claimed the dam’s
‘We are working with our suppliers to conserve water and recognise the concerns of the local community’
water level, which should be at 60 to 70 per cent of capacity at this time of year, is at 42 per cent.
Rob Moore, manager of the Eat Seasonably campaign, said that growing fruit outside its natural season required “a vast amount of water or a vast amount of energy”. He added that the supermarkets needed to “get with the picture” and “sort outsourcing from this particular place, or at least help make it sustainable”.
Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, which represents the supermarkets, said: “Retailers are acutely aware of the need to maintain high environmental standards across all the products they sell. This is audited to ensure standards are upheld. Retailers also work closely with their suppliers to improve biodiversity.”
A spokesman for John Lewis, Waitrose’s owner, said: “We are constantly working with our suppliers to conserve water and recognise the concerns of the local community in Alentejo.”