Number of tomato growers in free fall, what’s going on? “I wonder if we will still be around in thirty years”

The numbers don’t lie, smaller greenhouse growers are on the decline. The Flemish tomato growers in particular have been hit hard in the past fifteen years: their number has fallen by no less than 68%. And yet we are producing more and more of the orange-red fruit. According to the Boerenbond, 75% of this production takes place in the province of Antwerp. Is the end of the small-scale grower inevitable due to all the high investments, increases in scale and heavy foreign competition? “This may be the last generation of family growers,” warns one of them.

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