The rain that fell in the past few days was more than welcome for most crops, including onions. Only the growers in the south of the country, where irrigation is not possible or allowed everywhere, are getting the short end of the stick. Incidentally, that does not create a great atmosphere on the onion market. It is mainly looking at each other.
Growers and sorters who wanted to build in some certainty have already done some business in the past period, from roughly €40 for harvesting around this week, to €18 to €20 for fully grown plant onions for delivery in August. This week it seems as if no one dares to burn their fingers on the onions. Trade at the grower is very quiet. That is not entirely illogical, by the way. Being able to harvest a week earlier or a week later can make quite a difference to the price and the tons, so it is understandable that growers and sorters wait until the onions are more or less ripe.
The supply of early new Dutch onions is limited, but the same applies to the demand. Many European countries have sufficient onions from their own harvest. The demand from Africa has yet to get going. Various exporters indicate that countries there, in addition to their own product, also have a relatively cheap supply of onions from, for example, Egypt, India or China. We cannot beat them on price at the moment.
The bandwidth in the DCA Bale Price Onions is wide this week. "With prices that were still traded on Monday, you are almost laughed at on Friday", according to an exporter. The supply of coarse onions is not overflowing at this stage of the season, so they are holding up better than the finer sizes.
Read here is the explanation from DCA Market Intelligence on the new quotations.