Spanish farmers, fishermen feel COVID-19 fallout

The start of spring is usually a profitable time for Sergio Gomez, a strawberry farmer in southern Spain, but the coronavirus pandemic has completely disrupted his harvest this year.

"We have been losing money for five days now!" he said.

Spain, like much of the rest of Europe, has been in a lockdown since mid-March to curb the spread of the virus and this has altered consumers' habits, with people making fewer trips to the supermarket and no longer eating out.

The closure of Spain's borders has added to the burden, leaving farmers struggling to bring in crucial temporary workers to pick produce and care for animals.

One of the hardest-hit crops has been strawberries from Huelva in the southern region of Andalusia, which supplies Europe with 90 percent of the fruit at this time of the year.

Demand for strawberries has been halved this year, according to farmers' unions.

And with the border with Morocco closed, only one-third of the temporary workers who usually come to pick strawberries were able to make the trip.

"The whole sector is very frightened," said Gomez, who exports 70 per cent of his crop to France, Poland and the Czech Republic.

Demand is "on a roller coaster", he added.

"One day I have an order and I have to work an hour extra, the next I am twiddling my thumbs."