THE severe winter weather has left local vegetable producers with whole crops ruined.

Peter Richardson of Riverford Organic at Home Farm, Newby Wiske, is one of the many affected.

He said: “The prolonged cold weather at the start of the year left some of our crops ruined. We lost all our purple sprouting broccoli and 95pc of our cauliflowers.”

However, he said customers had remained loyal and not reverted back to the supermarkets.

Mr Richardson, who grows more than 20 crops on the farm, said it had also been difficult for their network of local growers and producers.

“But we have continued to support them, and now that the weather is warming up, spring vegetables have started to appear,” he said.

Riverford celebrated its third anniversary in February and has also become the fastest growing veg box scheme in the UK, delivering more than 3,000 boxes of organic produce every week.

Home Farm has increased its deliveries by 40pc over the past year and delivers its award-winning organic boxes via its team of delivery franchisees spanning Yorkshire and the North-East.

Every box contains a weekly newsletter including recipe suggestions and the Riverford Cooks project aims to help more people to cook with seasonal vegetables.

In August, Riverford will set up a travelling restaurant on the farm to serve meals prepared from local, seasonal and organic produce straight from the fields.

Nationally, the Riverford network delivers to 60,000 households. Last year, it was named the best ethical business in the Observer Ethical Awards, won the fruit and vegetable and organic retailer sections of the Soil Association’s Organic Food awards and was named a National Example of Excellence in BITC’s Rural Action award.