The port of Southampton's annual Canary Island season is under way with fresh produce passing through the city's Western Docks bound for supermarket shelves around the UK.
Around 120,000 tonnes of palletised produce, the majority of which consists of tomatoes, is handled by the docks each year. Smaller volumes of peppers, avocados and cucumbers are also moved over the dockside during the season, which normally runs from October and May.
The first consignment of 748 pallets of tomatoes and cucumbers has been discharged at the port's dedicated Canary Islands Fruit Terminal in the Western Docks.
This season, the five reefer vessels Magami, Chikuma, Humblut, Global Harvest and Grace will make up the fleet, which will operate the regular service to the port that calls between two and three times a week.
The port of Southampton has the facilities to handle other fresh produce, and recently Harvester arrived at the docks and discharged 1,200 pallets of oranges from Santos in Brazil.
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