We can survive outside of the EU when it comes to trade – the shipment of Californian lettuces prove this

The Common Agricultural Policy does somewhat cramp our style when shopping around world markets. For decades before the British joined the European Community in 1973 we had a magnificent tradition of sourcing cheap foodstuffs from all over the world

Lettuces on the shelves at Sainsbury's at Castle Boulevard, Nottingham as as lettuce became the latest staple to fall victim to the European vegetable shortage "crisis" (PA)

Like the plot of a memorable Wallace and Gromit romp, (the Curse of the Were-Rabbit, in case you found it less memorable, btw), the Great British Veg Shortage is growing to absurd proportions. We now learn the only thing standing between the British and an empty salad bowl is a consignment of sweet lettuce from California, even now being hastily harvested and despatched by air freight half way across the world. Such is the specialness of the Special Relationship that it is good enough to eat.

Of course it isn’t genetically modified bunnies or even the capricious French to whom we owe this crisis but to a cold snap on the Continent, possibly (almost certainly) exacerbated by climate change. Anyway it helps to put the whole Brexit thing into perspective. It shows, for those worried, that there are sources of good food far beyond the European Community. Like America. Indeed I have yet to see anyone argue the case that, on the whole, grocery bills would be lower with the UK outside the EU than inside it.

The Common Agricultural Policy does somewhat cramp our style when shopping around world markets. For decades before the British joined the European Community in 1973 we had a magnificent tradition of sourcing cheap foodstuffs from all over the world. Admittedly much of this was a legacy of imperialism, but it wasn’t unfair trade, even so, or at least by the 1970s. What has happened since then has been less glorious – such as our abandonment of St Lucia banana producers (their delicious produce still has a foothold in Waitrose, I should add).

Whatever, in 1973 we were well used to getting our wheat from the US and Canada, butter, lamb and beef from Australia and New Zealand, cocoa from West Africa, tea and coffee from India, East Africa and Sri Lanka, sugar form the West Indies and so on. When food represented a larger proportion of the budget of British households than it does now, such a global marketplace operated more often than not to the advantage of the purchasing power of what used to be called the British housewife. Nowadays we’re wealthier, and it matters less; but some of the same principles apply, notably to the more expensive purchase we make. We can return to world markets and try unfamiliar things, such as the fine Indian, yes Indian, red wine I found at Marks and Spencer on the weekend.

What about “big ticket” items? German cars, of which we are inordinately fond, may find themselves more expensively priced – or would they? For we have an opportunity to import competitively priced vehicles from elsewhere in the world – as it goes including German engineered and badged vehicles made in, say, the USA, or Swedish cars, for that matter, built in China. Not everything German comes from Germany, you see. If you’d like a nice BMW X5 SUV you can still have one – assembled in South Carolina. China-made Volvo limousines will soon be on sale here in Europe. The same goes for virtually every product that draws our consumerist attention. Just as our parents and grandparents shopped the world for their suppers, so we can now shop the world for what excites our every appetite.

There is such a thing as a world market, and few nations are eccentric enough to impose duties on what they sell to us. Prices, movements in incomes, investment decisions – all will in due course adjust to Brexit, and not all of them will be disastrous.

“Not all”? Indeed. Some will be extremely painful, at least in the short run. The Leave campaign, it is admitted, was not up front and honest enough with people about what might happen in the first few years. Of course, we don’t know how the negotiations will go, but, as is evident from hints emerging from Government, our own car industry, aviation, food and drink, pharma and above all financial services may be hit quite hard. The fact that a leg of lamb is 60p cheaper at Asda may not be regarded as adequate compensation for that; but a much wider benefit in importing cheaper goods and services from abroad is there for the having, at least potentially.

Is it mad, in fact, to advocate not only free trade with the USA, but a unilateral policy of free trade? It is, for sure, an unfashionable idea. From Donald Trump to Marine Le Pen (OK not a great distance there), all the talk is of protection and preserving jobs in aspic. By contrast, the UK could go for an ultra-liberal, free-market economy that would offer the best prospect of benefitting from economic change and being able to adjust to it (some government intervention might well be needed to rescue communities in emergencies, though): not the shopkeeper of the world, but the shopper. We’d be vulnerable to “dumping” by unscrupulous nations, and would need to guard against it, but there’d be lots of real bargains. For those who clung to their jobs in Brexit Britain life could be sweet; for the rest, life would be bitter indeed – a more divided nation for sure.

Maybe, in the end, all this is impractical and it’s just politically unthinkable to really try to turn the UK into some sort of Singapore of Europe (even if that were an accurate description of the Singaporean economy’s role). It is, though, worth contemplating if there is “no deal”. Making the best of Brexit will require some radical thinking, and not just about where to source a fresh lettuce.