As an onion exporter, Egypt is well on its way to further strengthening its position in the world market. The country benefits from a long export season and has significantly increased production in recent years.
The vast majority of onions are still grown in China and India, together accounting for almost half of global production. But Egypt now occupies a good third place. Onion production in the African country is expected to reach 3,1 million tons this year. Egypt narrowly surpasses the United States among the largest onion producers. For comparison: the Netherlands is in tenth place with almost 1,5 million tons.
The government of Egypt gives high priority to agriculture and encourages farmers to produce more. Primarily to safeguard food security in the country, but there is also an export ambition behind it. After oranges and potatoes, onions are Egypt's most important agricultural export product and the country would like to expand this further.
Area is growing rapidly
This is reflected in the production figures, which have tripled in 15 years. Onion production in Egypt only passed the 2005 million ton mark for the first time in 1 and then took off. After some fluctuations, production last two years was around 2,9 million tons. An area increase of reportedly 5% will push volume to a new record this year.
A large part of domestic production is used to feed our own population. However, that does not mean that Egyptians do not play a significant role in global exports. On the contrary. According to the FAO, the export of Egyptian onions last year amounted to 550.000 tons. If we compare these figures with the 310.000 tons in 2018, this means a significant increase of no less than 77%.
Exceptionally high demand from India
The increase in export volume in 2019 can largely be attributed to the situation in India. India is normally one of the largest onion exporters in the world, but last year a large part of the country's harvest was lost due to monsoons. The country decided to impose an export ban and was forced to import additional onions, including from Egypt. The global onion market, including Dutch exporters, benefited from higher prices.
Apart from the exceptional demand from India, Egyptian onion exports are showing an upward trend. Egypt Today reported in July that onion exports had already increased to more than 6 tons in the first 273.000 months. A major advantage of Egypt is that the country is early to the market with the new harvest of onions. The export season is therefore long. Yellow onions are usually exported from February to November and red onions from April to December.
Main customers
With growing production, Egypt expects to be able to increase volumes to the largest customers. The most important markets for Egyptian onions are Russia, the Gulf States led by Saudi Arabia, North America and last but not least: the European Union. A large part of European demand comes from the Netherlands.
At the beginning of last year, demand from the EU was extra strong, because stocks dried up early due to a poor harvest in 2018. Insiders report that demand from the EU in the first half of 2020 was 42.000 tons. That would be less than a third of the requested volume of last year. For the time being, this does not seem to have any influence on the export volumes presented by Egypt. At the end of the year it should become clear to what extent the country succeeds in achieving its ambitions on the world market.