Lettuce Enjoy Local Leafy Greens

Buy Local Christmas Campaign 2025 – Tasmanian Irrigation

There’s currently a semi-trailer load of baby leaf salad greens – grown, washed, packed and dispatched – from FreshGro’s south-east Tasmanian farms each day.

With 40 FTE employees working on 60 hectares planted to 10 different lettuce mix varieties, as well as baby spinach and wild rocket, FreshGro Farm Manager Matt Bancal is frantically juggling staff and logistics.

“It’s that time of year and we are producing as much baby leaf salad mix as possible for the festive season,” Matt said.

“It’s about four weeks from planting to harvest, so timing is crucial to ensure we can supply our markets at the right time.”

Privately owned by Bryce Henderson, FreshGro is growing lettuce in both Queensland and Tasmania, focusing on supplying triple-washed produce all year round. Strict quality control processes, environmentally sustainable farming practices and soil nutrition underpin FreshGro’s commitment to delivering the freshest and cleanest products to market.

Currently 95 per cent of their salad leaves are boxed and sold via wholesalers to mainland retailers, but Matt would love to see the Tasmanian market share increase to about 50 per cent of their production.

“Most of the lettuce you see on shelves in Tasmania is from Victoria so it would be great if consumers can proactively ask supermarket owners for local lettuce so that we can see more of our product on Tassie shelves,” he said.

“It’s the perfect time of year for salads – whether with local seafood, beef, lamb, pork or roasted vegetables – so hopefully all Tasmanians will enjoy many great salads during the summer and festive period.”

Also crucial to the success of FreshGro’s business is access to high-surety irrigation water.

They currently lease two properties near Richmond, including the land previously owned by Houston’s Farm, and are looking to develop further. This will assist with crop rotations and spelling paddocks to boost soil health.

FreshGro relies on at least 200 megalitres of water from the South East Irrigation Scheme Stage Two, all leased from neighbouring properties.

“There is no point planting baby leaf crops without access to secure irrigation water,” Matt said.

“When you have a business that is so heavily affected by weather, Tassie is somewhat of a safe haven as we don’t have the huge storms and hail to contend with, and our ability to grow early in the morning right through to 9pm at night is of huge appeal.

“We harvest in the morning from 7am to lunch time, and then we wash and pack and dispatch every day.

“We couldn’t do what we do without access to Tasmanian Irrigation water.”

For more information about FreshGro, please visit www.freshgro.net.au.

For more information about the South East Irrigation Scheme Stage Two, please visit www.tasmanianirrigation.com.au/schemes/south-east-stage-2.