Flevo Onions also benefits from late price increase

The result for the yellow seed onions is €43 per 100 kilos (week 13, 50% coarse), including compensation for Global Gap and excluding weighing costs. Making a comparison with last season is not very relevant, but the difference does appeal to the imagination. This price was last year namely €34 lower. "Normally we talk about a difference of half cents, but now it was about increments of €5," says Remko Wilms, the pool manager, about the special market.

There is no big difference with the price of red onions, which comes to €44,21 per 100 kilos (with the same specifications). The storage pool for yellow onions started in week 43 and ended in week 21. "We started early this year and immediately started germination tests. As a result, we noticed that some batches had to be removed quickly. The last batch was collected in week 21, which is approximately 1 month earlier than normal," Wilms reports. "This year the pool committee has decided to reward both storage and size. This way, as a pool, you can also reward growers who grow what the market demands."

Higher than stock price
If we compare the results of the pool with the average stock market price, the pool comes out well. The stock market price for yellow seed onions (over the weeks mentioned) was €40,65 and above Red onions it came to €38,97. Flevo Onions' short storage pool also did well this year, with a price of €31,27 per 100 kilos. "However, in the end, storage paid off, although it was still exciting after New Year's Eve. The price shot up in April and we were able to benefit from that. The advantage of a pool is that you also have onions. A grower who only has 1 lot to sell, they will (rightly) not want to take that risk," says Wilms.

In the beginning, the onions were mainly sold to Asia and Africa. "However, Asia quickly dropped out, because they could get cheaper onions from China. Africa also quickly said goodbye, which also had to do with the price. The countries did not return even after the New Year. Then we had to wait for demand from Eastern Europe, which started in March; Poland, the Czech Republic and the Balkan countries in particular needed a lot of onions. They really had a bad season in Eastern Europe and in March the product was gone. At the beginning of the season it went into Poland is also bad. They even paid well for the tare."

Few concerns about Dutch position
"A year like this teaches us that the Netherlands cannot always divide and conquer," Wilms continues. "You saw that trade was going to be different, because countries such as China, South Africa and Egypt were taking our positions. As the Netherlands, we have to prove ourselves again this season, although I am not too worried about that. We grow the best onions and, for example, Asian customers just want to pay for our onions."

"The number of pool participants remains good. This year, a number of growers have been tempted to do business from the field because of the good prices. However, even in such an extreme season you see that it is nice to participate in a pool. High prices lead to high tensions and then a pool committee has just an extra pair of eyes," Wilms explains.

Next season
"As far as the coming season is concerned, the weather is still in charge," says Wilms. "More has been sown and the coming weeks will show reasonable growth. However, if the moisture shortage is not made up, a copy of the 2018 harvest may also occur."

He continues: "The trade in second-year onion onions is already starting to pick up and the yields seem to be reasonably good. This is more variable with seed onions. In Oldambt and Groningen the onions are less available, but near the border with Germany (in Drenthe) they are available. relatively good. In Southern Flevoland it is moderate, but in the Noordoostpolder the onions are generally in reasonable condition. They are also in good condition in the south. Growers will not allow it to happen this year that they start irrigation too late. "

Competition for the onions
The participants of the Flevo Onions pool were in the right place last season, because there were better yields in the north than in the south. "But that does not mean that we had it much easier than the trade in the southwest. They saw every day how bad it was in the south and started purchasing earlier in regions that are normally our hinterland," Wilms concludes.