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Analysis Onions

Is the worst behind us on the onion market?

3 May 2024 - Jurphaas Lugtenburg

Sorters do a good job for the time of year and that gives some confidence. Growers no longer say yes and amen to every offer. It goes too far to speak of optimism, but the biggest panic has subsided for a while.

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Quality problems are not a new phenomenon, but with a relatively warm week behind us, there is another wave of supply with germination problems. These are generally onions that were no longer pure and when the temperature rises, everything goes a little faster. Polish buyers are less active in the Netherlands this week, but the prices remaining remain fairly stable. Depending on the problems in a batch, prices are somewhere between €5 and €10. No prizes to write home about, but every little bit helps to clear the supplies.

There are more than enough onions. Getting a good match is a different story. The range within which Dutch sorters are on the market is relatively wide. The lower end is around €10 and that rises to around €16 for the good onions. Growers with outdoor air storage feel the need to no longer wait very long before selling and, more importantly, delivering. Some sorters are betting that a few of those good lots will surface. On the other hand, there is a group of growers with top product in mechanical cooling who hope that after mid-May there will be a gap between the old Dutch harvest and new imported onions.

Export is going well despite the holiday period
The export feels a bit friendlier. The bale price is bottoming out and that ensures that buyers do not wait until the last minute to order. Several sorters indicate that they are busy. This will partly be because work for next week is being brought forward. On the other hand: this week it was May 1, the day on which half of Europe came to a standstill, and there was little sign of that in the demand. What certainly also plays a role is that not all packing stations participate equally. Some are having a May holiday and will see when they will start up again and whether they will do anything this season. 

The onion prices in the DCA quotation Bale price of Onions pull slightly towards each other. Triplets and means remain unchanged. Gross and super take a step back. Ultimately, the price of the onions in the bale largely depends on quality and destination. Do they stay within Europe and reach their destination within a few days or do they have to stay in the container for weeks? There could easily be a difference of €5.

Read here is the explanation from DCA Market Intelligence on the new quotations.

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