Tesco has become the latest supermarket to remove purchase limits across fruit and vegetables as stock shortages begin to ease.
The leading retailer introduced limits on sales of tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers to three of each item per customer last month, however according to reporting by The Grocer, this was dropped on Tuesday.
Last week discount grocer Lidl, which had imposed the same restrictions, confirmed to Grocery Gazette that all would be lifted by 13 March, while Aldi has also removed limits and Asda began lifting final restrictions yesterday (14 March).
Although cucumbers were no longer being rationed at Morrisons last week, shoppers can still only buy up to two items per person across tomatoes, lettuce and peppers.
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The shortages were first said to be caused by “difficult weather conditions in the South of Europe and Northern Africa,” according to British Retail Consortium director of food and sustainability, Andrew Opie.
However, some industry experts claimed this to be an effect of Brexit, while British farms have suffered as many growers have had to cut back due to the rocketing costs of heating greenhouses.
Earlier this month, the government’s food tsar, Henry Dimbleby who advises ministers on a food strategy for England said the lack of fresh produce available was a “market failure”.
According to reporting by The Guardian, he added that Europe was not facing these shortages as “nowhere else in the world”, has this “weird supermarket culture.”
As a result of the shortages, data by NIQ found that unit sales of tomatoes declined by 17.6%, with vine tomatoes worse hit by a drop in sales of 28.9% and peppers down by 16.8%.
