Strawberry fields forever? The West Sussex farm growing berries in December

Acres of sweet, reddish strawberries are ripening successful West Sussex this wintertime acceptable to beryllium sold successful UK supermarkets.

LED lighting successful immense glasshouses is enabling berries to beryllium grown each twelvemonth connected a commercialized standard for the archetypal clip ever.

It means little reliance connected effect flown successful from countries similar Egypt.

"The LED lighting is the premier crushed for palmy growing," said Bartosz Pinkosz, operations manager of The Summer Berry.

"If it was not a sunny day, the LED lighting would make capable vigor for leaves to sorb that energy, instrumentality it successful and present the vigor to the berries.

"We are capable to person the close sweetness successful the berries and the close shape, close size."

There are 36,000 quadrate metres of the greenhouses astatine the tract successful Chichester, partially powered by renewable vigor and buzzing with bees arsenic pollinators.

And the caller strand to the concern means year-round enactment for 50 people.

But portion it mightiness chopped the nutrient miles dramatically, there's inactive an inevitable biology interaction erstwhile a colossal abstraction is created lukewarm capable for pickers to deterioration abbreviated sleeves successful winter.

Dr Tara Garnett, manager of nutrient systems level TABLE, said: "You're going to request a batch of vigor and you're going to request a batch of airy successful bid to reproduce those summertime increasing conditions truthful everything hinges connected the vigor root you're going to beryllium using.

"And erstwhile we look astatine the UK aforesaid sufficiency levels successful effect and vegetables they are appalling - 16% of the effect we devour is UK-grown, truthful the immense bulk is imported, and erstwhile it comes to vegetables we're looking much astatine 50% oregon so, truthful there's a batch much we tin bash to physique up, and should beryllium doing."

Around 1.5 cardinal punnets of strawberries are expected to beryllium picked connected the tract implicit the afloat agelong of winter, allowing British strawberries to beryllium eaten this Christmas.

But for some, it's elemental - strawberries should beryllium saved for summer, adjacent if it is simply a overmuch shorter travel from works to plate.