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Britain is running out of food warehouses that retailers and manufacturers need to stock their goods before a possible Brexit without agreement – and the shortage could result from Amazon's booking of spaces, announced MPs.
Ian Wright, chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation, told the Business and Industrial Strategy Committee (BEIS) Tuesday that the lack of space has led to an increase in the cost of refrigerated warehouses, even though the shelves were empty.
He said, "What we do not know is that there is a real product in these places. There is gossip … that a lot of that [space] has been booked by Amazon for its entry into the food market over the next few months. "
But he added: "All retailers are inevitably terrified by this prospect and will talk about it." Wright told MPs that this would be a useful question for Amazon.
It appeared this month that the demand for frozen and chilled warehouses had increased as food producers and retailers began implementing their traffic reduction plans without Brexit. For many, it means storing.
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The warehouses where everything is stored, from garden peas to half – baked supermarket bread to potatoes, have been sold out for the next six months and customers have been turned back, officials said. industry.
Nestlé's director, Ian Rayson, told Wright at the BEIS session that the agribusiness group has been stepping up Brexit planning in the UK and Europe since the summer and is in talks with the US Department of Agriculture. Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
"We have created inventories for some of the products we import into the UK, and we are also doing that in other European markets, some of which we export from the UK to that country. So we build stocks at both ends, but it only lasts a few weeks.
"There are limits to the stock you can build for many reasons. Warehousing is a problem and some ingredients have a fairly limited shelf life, so there are limits in this regard.
MEPs have learned that the cost of packaging has increased because of the increase in demand before Brexit.
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Wright said, "There are significant challenges, particularly with respect to cardboard and paper packaging. If I remember correctly, 600,000 tons of this [is] used every year, 90% of it is imported, 80% of it is imported from the EU, so any blockage of the supply chain as a result of a Brexit without agreement would be pretty disastrous because you only hold – usually in the entire industry – somewhere between eight and 10 weeks of stock.
"What we have seen in recent months is a rise in prices because there is a shortage and people are buying futures."
The Guardian has contacted Amazon to comment on its warehouse reservations, but the group has not yet responded.
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