British strawberries are synonymous with great summer sporting events like Wimbledon, Royal Ascot and the Henley Royal Regatta - but no longer are they just a staple fruit for the warmer seasons in the UK.

So, beyond the pub quiz random fact that they aren’t really berries at all, what can we learn from strawberries and their all year round appeal?

Understanding the value chain 

Investigating the work that goes into bringing these non-berries to our table can help us to understand what drives the value chain, building respect for the part that each stakeholder plays, and the ingenuity and innovation that goes into strawberry production. It can also help us to understand the issues and trade-offs that arise from a food system that works to meet consumer demand all year round and identify the questions about sustainability that we might need to answer for our shoppers.

The UK strawberry food chain is a complex one that involves many different people, from farmers to retailers to consumers. The chain begins with the planting of strawberry seedlings, which are then grown in fields or greenhouses. Once the strawberries are ripe, they are harvested and packed. Typically the strawberries are then transported to distribution centres, where they are sorted and packaged for sale. Finally, the strawberries are sold to consumers in supermarkets, farmers markets, or other retail outlets. 

This value chain faces a number of sustainability challenges, including food waste, the use of pesticides, and the environmental impact of transportation. However, there are also a number of opportunities to make the chain more sustainable. For example, consumers can buy locally grown strawberries, supermarkets can adopt more sustainable packaging practices, and farmers can use more sustainable growing practices. Let’s pick up on a few of these aspects.

Changing the way we approach production to shelf

We may have become used to buying fruit twelve months a year, however, farmers have experimented with “forcing” crops since the eighteenth century and today the coming together of a combination of techniques means that in just a generation, these advances in farming have extended the homegrown strawberry season from about six weeks in the 1990s to typically about twenty weeks today, and in some cases all 365 days a year - for the first time we are seeing strawberries grown in the UK available on Christmas Day!

This year round advancement means we are able to begin to meet the growing demand of sustainable food production within the UK, whilst reducing the need to import fruit from abroad - last year in the UK we spent £778 million on strawberries with home production of strawberries of 119,000 tonnes, supplemented with imports of 59,000 tonnes, just part of the £1.7 billion retail berry industry.

Since the RHS first catalogued existing strawberry varieties in 1822, selective breeding programmes have created new strawberry varieties - and whilst retailers are criticised for their focus on shape, size and uniformity, future breeding programmes can target flavour trends, climate resilience, or plants suited to robotic harvesting or vertical farming,  supported by increased scientific understanding from research such as the mapping of the cultivated strawberry genome in 2019.

New farming methods have developed in tandem with new varieties, largely focused on increasing control of the growing environment to promote an extended strawberry season, together with increasing yield and efficiency. The most visible evidence is of permanent glasshouses and temporary plastic polytunnel greenhouses however inside these structures there has been a move from soil growing towards “table top” production.

Table top production is a soilless system, typically using coir, a by-product of the coconut industry as a substrate together with hydroponic irrigation systems that provide the essential nutrients. Here are some of its key features:

• Trickle irrigation allows greater control using 40% less water than growing in soil as well as the potential to recycle run-off. The green / glass house structures can allow rainwater to be collected and stored, further reducing the need for freshwater. 

• The use of substrates has made pest and disease management more efficient including the use of biological controls to reduce pesticide usage and the controlled environment allows for other precision techniques too, vision systems can predict ripening reducing the risk of spoilage and there are examples of disease control through robotics. 

• Whilst robotic harvesting is still at an early stage, table top production has reduced the labour required for husbandry and cropping, allowing double the picking rates of soil grown strawberries. 

Whilst milder conditions are playing a part, with increased winter sunlight increasing photosynthesis and increased temperatures leading to record UK harvests, the demand for year-round strawberries presents an opportunity for completely controlled environment agriculture. 

There are a number of trailblazers really beginning to explore many new ways of working to bring “local” strawberries grown year round, with innovations right across their businesses and through their operating models in the quest to bring the best fruits to the market - here's a great 3 minute video here that demonstrates how an integrated approach works in practice at the Dyson Farming base in Lincolnshire. Also in the UK, we see Flexfarming promising net zero strawberries using an innovative energy approach demonstrated at a pilot farm in Somerset. Whilst in the USA, Oishii has built the world's largest indoor vertical strawberry farm that combines unique strawberry varieties with consistent growing conditions.

Innovations extend all the way to the retailer, with improvements to packaging design to minimise spoilage.  For example, “Air-Light” and “ Monoair” PET punnets incorporate recycled plastic and do away with bubble-wrap padding whilst still providing protection against damage; corrugated cardboard and cartonboard punnets are premium alternatives to plastic and cardboard and pulp punnets from wood or bagasse are home compostable.

Recently there have been more calls to understand the carbon footprint of many products particularly produce lines, where we see many ranges flown in from various parts of the world. Many shoppers would like to have this clarity at point of sale and clearly labelled on the packaging to show the important elements - from food miles, to water usage and workers fairly paid and treated well for their input to the final product. British strawberries have been the subject in a few media articles as people try to understand the benefit of buying local on the environment - many going directly to food miles as their environmental currency of choice, albeit that this is not the only part of the equation to consider. Ultimately the new wave of farming practises shining through in this particular field (of strawberries) are doing so with many of the carbon inducing elements well thought through, some even achieving carbon neutrality whilst bringing their fruits to bear.

What next?

Supply chains for produce like strawberries are short, with relatively few steps from farm to fork, however whilst simple in concept they still offer the opportunity for significant innovation with multiple benefits. 

The developments described may have been focused on availability and efficiency, however a recent study suggests that overall the application of so-called plasticulture techniques is a positive step for strawberry cultivation because it can both increase the yield and reduce environmental impacts compared to open field techniques, although the study also notes that plastic pollution then makes up a considerable share of the overall environmental impact of strawberry farming. 

We are left with more questions about making strawberries more sustainable - how sustainable is coir as a substrate? Where do the nutrients for soilless systems come from? What happens to old plants at the end of a season? What trade-offs would regenerative strawberry bring?

If one crop is this interesting then what does that mean for more complex products? And how can you communicate your brand to your consumers in a relevant way without an in-depth understanding of your ingredients?

For food and drink businesses interested in sustainability our three top tips on understanding your ingredients are:

1. Learn how to recognise the different ways that your product and packaging choices might (unknowingly) impact sustainability  

2. Take ownership of the topic for the sake of your brand / product and  build your own knowledge and understanding of the dilemmas’ that our food systems pose because we all need to work together to make our food more sustainable

3. Communicate openly and humbly about your approach to build loyalty and trust in your consumers

To learn more about how you can approach a more sustainable future in your business, speak to us today