The pre-St. Patrick's Day push for cabbage is on and still heavily packing out of Florida. "Demand is slightly stronger this year I think," says Eric Hansen of Hansen Farms LLC, a cabbage grower who is currently shipping storage cabbage out of New York. "Generally, the pull is for fresh crop cabbage because it's volume–we don't have that volume in storage. Though there is some storage demand. The storage crop also tends to be pretty heavily contracted."
Right now, the market is seeing average conditions with enough supply to meet demand. "The market is average. Cartons of cabbage out of Florida are around $10 for St. Patrick's timing so that's not a runaway price for a farmer but I've seen it lower as well," says Hansen, adding that after the holiday, demand will likely soften for cabbage.
Transitions ahead
Florida's fresh crop cabbage season has a sizable run from December to April. While Northern Florida takes longer to finish up its supply, the season then transitions to Georgia in May, then North Carolina in June, and then into states such as New York, Ohio, and Michigan in July.
That July season also coincides with the cabbage season out of Canada. "Our competitors are there and there's definitely more product coming here from Canada than we ship there. In that situation, the potential tariffs would help but there are other things involved," he says. "Mexico is also a factor, though especially on the West Coast so tariffs would help the industry there as well."
For more information:
Eric Hansen
Hansen Farms
Tel: +1 585-526-5260
eehansen7@gmail.com
http://hansenfarms.com