UK: organic market worth £2.2 billion

Graphic © Soil Association

Last week, Soil Association launched its 2018 Organic Market Report. The report shows that the UK organic market has grown by 6% to over £2.2 billion in 2017. During the last six years, the organic market has grown steadily, now constituting 1.5% of the whole UK food and drink market.

In 2017, the turnover of organic products in independent retail grew by 9.7% and home delivery by 9.5%, accounting for almost 13% of the organic market. At the moment, around a third of all organic sales are being generated on the high street or online. While the supermarket turnover of non organic food only rose by just over 2%, organic supermarket sales rose by 4.2%.

Further organic key growth areas in the UK:

• Produce, up 6.5%, had the highest value growth, reaching over £20m in sales
• Chilled foods had impressive increases at 21%, now constituting for 3.4% of the total UK organic market
• Sales in foodservice, including through the Organic Served Here scheme, grew by 10.2%
• Expenditure on the Food for Life Served Here program increased by 20% to £18 million
• Dairy sales grew by around 3%, and still have the highest share of the organic food and drink market at almost 29%
• The popularity of organic wine continues to rise, with a turnover of beers/wines/spirits growing by over 8% and many supermarkets expanding their ranges of wines

Graphic © Soil Association

Clare McDermott, Business Development Director, Soil Association Certification, commented: “We know shoppers are putting increasing value on trust, transparency and traceability when making their purchasing decisions. Organic delivers on those values and is also increasingly seen as the healthy and ethical choice thanks to mounting evidence of the difference between organic and non-organic, both in terms of nutrition and environmental impact. This stamp of assurance will only become more important as understanding of organic increases and we look toward the formation of new trade deals post-Brexit. Encouragingly, shoppers are remaining loyal to UK organic in the face of this, lifted by the assurance and benefits the organic label and Soil Association symbol brings, and we expect the market to continue growing at pace in coming years.”

For further information and the whole report please the Soil Association website.