For the first time in the history of the global tomato products industry, a country's trade deficit has exceeded the symbolic threshold of one billion US dollars. This new record was set by the UK market, which is a major one in terms of volume and the world leader in terms of value, with net expenditure reaching USD 1.08 billion last year.
For many years now, the UK has been the world's leading market in terms of value for tomato product imports, ahead of Germany, France, Japan, Canada, Australia, Saudi Arabia and others. Last year, the British trade balance for tomato products, all categories combined, reached the value of USD 1.08 billion, a milestone in the history of our industry, and in a context where the total overall balance of the ten main countries importing tomato products has grown at the exceptional annual rate (CAGR) of 12% over the last five years, reaching USD 4.3 billion in 2023/2024.
This significant increase in expenditure, which can be observed on the British market as on many others, is not proportionally linked to an increase in imported quantities. While imports of tomato pastes did indeed record an increase of around 28% in terms of volume after 2021/2022, UK spending on this sector has risen by 114%. As for other types of products, the quantities of canned tomatoes imported have fallen over the last ten years (CAGR -0.8%) from 339,000 tonnes (t) to 317,000 t, while their value has increased by 25%. Imports of sauces, which increased at an average annual rate (CAGR) of 0.3% over the ten years under review, recorded an increase in British spending of around 60% (see additional information at the end of this article).
Supplies to the British market are almost exclusively of European origin, with the vast majority coming from western European processing countries (Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Greece, Germany). Despite growing rapidly in recent years, the share of products from other regions and countries (Turkey, Poland, China and a few others) remains marginal overall, at around 10% over the last three years.
What about EU products in the future?
A survey carried out in April 2024 on behalf of the European Commission, which questioned wholesalers, importers, producers and HORECA professionals in seven different sectors of the UK food and drink industrial supply chain, revealed that the majority will continue to import from the EU over the next 12 months. The EU should therefore remain an essential resource for the UK food and drink industry despite the challenges imposed by Brexit.
However, unlike the sectors of wine, beer and spirits, dairy, meat and charcuterie, and bakery, which showed a clear commitment to EU sourcing (between 70 and 100%), the sectors of confectionery and fruit & vegetables expressed the highest level of uncertainty or non-commitment. These two sectors have only shown a 30% commitment to sourcing additional references from the EU in 2025, according to the data.
Quality (95%), price (81%), authenticity (78%), and sustainability (77%) are the most important factors when adding new references to product ranges. At the same time, authenticity and tradition were voted the most popular characteristics of EU food and drink products.
Finally, over two-thirds of the UK professionals consulted (66%) agreed that the EU Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) and organic labels were either "very important" or "fairly important" when sourcing ingredients. Overall recognition of those three labels within the UK industry is high. About two-thirds of the respondents know what they are and what they mean.
"It is clear that the relationship between the UK and EU is incredibly important," an expert said. "In 2023 the UK was the number one destination for EU agri-food, accounting for 22% of exports and with a value of Euro51.3bn." Meanwhile, UK exports to the EU were down almost a quarter in the first half of 2024, according to the Food and Drink Fédération Trade Snapshot.
Supply sources for the UK market
Fifteen or so national industries jointly supplied the UK market in 2023/2024, with no major changes compared to the previous year.
Italian tomato products clearly dominate the UK market in both the tomato paste and canned tomatoes categories, with only the Netherlands taking the lead in the sauces and ketchup sector. The other "first-stage processor" countries are logically among the UK's leading suppliers. On the strength of its performance in all three product categories, Portugal features third in this ranking, ahead of Spain, whose average results in the canned tomatoes and sauces sectors only place it fourth in 2023/2024.
With greater quantities of pastes and canned tomatoes exported to the UK in 2023/2024 than in the previous year, the Greek industry consolidated its fifth place in the group of main suppliers to this country. Well behind and with much smaller tonnages, Turkish, Chinese, German, Polish, Egyptian, Chilean, etc. operators are also involved in supplying the British market, generally in only one of the three sectors under consideration.
Some complementary data
UK spending on imports of tomato products very exactly doubled between 2016/2017 and 2023/2024, rising from USD 559 million to USD 1.12 billion.
Over the ten-year period, UK spending on pastes grew at average annual rates (CAGR) of 10%, canned tomatoes by 2.6% and sauces and ketchup by 5.4%.
Source: TDM, foodanddrinktechnology.com, fruitnet.com, foodmanufacture.co.uk
