Sometimes it almost seems as if the onion world is no bigger than the African continent this time of year. If African buyers fail, the mood among the onion exporting Netherlands quickly becomes depressed. When African countries do buy, the mood quickly changes, as became apparent this week. Although there were some snags.
The talk of the day among onion sorters is the boat for Africa. At the beginning of this week things were difficult and very competitive prices had to be set. Many sorters participated, but not quite in the numbers expected. Some saw it mainly as an opportunity to get rid of stocks that were already on the long side. As the week progressed, it became apparent that there was room for upward movement in the price.
Poland presents itself
European destinations are also fairly active on the Dutch market for this time of year. We are used to Polish buyers picking up industrial onions, but now they also buy good onions from growers and even sorted onions are purchased in small packages or big bags. The latter category is a bonus for sorters after all the problems that occur with onions that are in transit for a long time. With a few days in the truck to Poland where they are sold immediately, the chance of things going wrong is a lot smaller than if they are on the road for weeks on the boat to Africa, where if all goes wrong they will also be left on the quay for a while. to stand. We should not overestimate the volumes that go to Eastern Europe, but everything that goes at good prices is a bonus.
The fact that it was a special week in trading is also reflected in the bale price. The DCA quotation Bale price of Onions on average across all measures takes another step back. This is largely due to the competitive prices for the triplets and at the start of the week at €32 at the bottom. In the second half of the week, the price recovered to the level of the end of last week. This suggests that the provisional low point in the market has passed. Coarse and supers remained fairly stable this week. For good onions suitable for Southern Europe, the price even tends to increase somewhat. This is partly because growers are reluctant to let go of such onions.