Rising onion market makes trade easier

This week things are going reasonably smoothly in the onion trade. Exports are certainly not breaking any records, but processors are pleasantly busy, several companies say. Growers are fairly locked into the contest. That keeps the market in balance. In a rising market, doing business is almost always pleasant. That also applies to the onion market this week. Neither in bags nor for field-grown onions are there any big price jumps, but as long as there is a slight upward trend, there are few complaints. Things are going almost too easily in the onion trade, and then you have to be careful, some insiders say. Getting the last onions dry indoors was not easy this week, but next week there will be opportunities again if the weather forecast is correct. Quality is also a point of attention. Some growers are finding out that the onions are not as good as they thought they were. Smooth trade Which direction the market will go is of course impossible to predict. With demand as it is now, several insiders are optimistic. It is not very busy, but sorters have done their work well. There is no real competing hard on bag prices. Some processors think that the average fine sorting of the onions this season plays a role in this. Automatic sorting has taken off quite a bit in recent years. According to some, the high number of onions in a ton costs capacity. One system can handle that better than another, however. Wait or sell? Now that things are going well on the onion market, you also hear from some sides that growers should not forget to sell the onions. Finer onions are generally more susceptible to bolting, and the warm weather this summer has not helped MH uptake either. In addition, Africa is of course the destination par excellence for the finer sizes. The comparison with the dry year 2018 does not fully hold for various reasons. Still, it is interesting to compare the price trend with this season. The average grower price of Holland Onions Association peaked then in December, only to take a step back after the turn of the year in the first weeks of 2019. Only at the very end of the season did the price start rising again. The DCA benchmark for packed onions is also continuing upward this week. By far the most trading is in the medium sizes. The share of coarse onions in a batch is often limited, according to sorters. For supers, it is difficult to put together a price. There are some, but that is often pallet work.