It's still early days, but the onion market is starting to take shape. With a clean slate and Senegal also arriving early on the market, the onion set harvest already seems to have a destination. The bale price has had its last largest fall for the time being, or so it is thought.
It had been in the air for a while, but last Monday it became officially clear that Senegal would open the border early to the import of onions. This means that the onion market is literally and figuratively heading towards the African country. This means that exporters will step up a gear in the coming weeks to load the ships. The bale price - which has now dropped somewhat, but is still at a higher level than usual - does not seem to be an issue.
Sorters and processors therefore get started with the onion sets quite early, compared to previous years. The clean market in which they start naturally also helps with this. The growers, in turn, notice that there is healthy demand and have confidence in the market. Even though the supply from the grower side is increasing somewhat, they are not just saying goodbye to their onion sets. The Goes grower's fair recorded a higher price this week by €2, which means it amounts to €39,50 per 100 kilos for onion onions field grown. Trade has now also taken place for well above €40.
Bale price stabilized
Bale prices, on the other hand, were under considerable pressure in previous weeks. This could not have been otherwise given the sky-high prices with which the seed onions of the 2022 harvest ended. The bale price also fell sharply this week. However, sorters and processors indicate that the balance has recovered reasonably well and is at a price level that allows large-scale exports. Compared to last week, the DCA quotation Bale price of Onions once again taken a big step back. On average, the bale price is now around €60. There does not appear to be any further major declines in the coming week.
Even though onion sets are already being prepared for export by sea, doing business is different compared to previous years. With the current price level of onion onions, there is a large amount of money in circulation between importers and exporters, just like last season. This is obviously different from a much lower bale price. In addition, not all tonnes of Dutch onions from last season have yet been paid for and that of course needs to be resolved.