There's been massive price increases in food here as well. I don't honestly keep in touch with it but it feels like a bag of vegetables and fruit now costs proper paper money while before it used to be silly metal money cheap.
I have never thought of we being different to northern countries regarding growing food, but I guess you're right. Must be the different climate as I think Italy is the same, some traditional dishes are very vegetable based not to be vegan or out of saving the planet but because that's how they are supposed to be, tasty and cheap with just a hint of meat derived something to give it seasoning, that's way more sustainable than going fully vegan with silly things like almond milk and plant based "chorizo", and also better than eating a t-bone every day.
It got away from me, in reply, yes we are very similar and some specific vegetables are treated as small treasures and very valued, a simple cabbage from the north of Portugal that tastes like nothing you can grow in the south, or the artichokes from Murcia in Spain that are canned in olive oil and sold for the same money as tuna. We still very much are a people of farmers that way, I suppose.