"The onion market has been enjoying broad and high demand for the last two weeks. Remarkably few graders have stock, not only because of the weather, but mainly because of the lack of confidence of the last month. That confidence was very low but is back to normal this week and that translates into rising bale prices. It's super nice to see the graders all able to accelerate again, old-fashioned enjoyment," said Lindert Moerdijk of MSP Onions.
"Due to the particularly high prices of the last two years, it was a case of wait and see whether all destinations would choose the Netherlands again, but fortunately you can see that Dutch onions are still in a preferred position. Because of the situation in the Middle East, we have also been able to do an unexpected amount there. To continue processing a large volume, we are not expected to have to go much higher than a bale price of 25 cents, which we expect to hit in the short term. The trick will be to stabilize that," Lindert said.
"With all this rain, we had expected higher hectare yields, but they are failing to materialize and we are ending up with average yields per hectare. This also translates into the fact that everyone is looking for the 60-80 and 75-105 sizes, which are only minimally available at the moment. We are very curious about the quality this year. So far, it is going well, but there are already some batches that are not good internally," says the grader who uses AI in its onion factory, where the grading technology ensures programmed quality.
"When Senegal officially opens soon and the Ivory Coast stabilizes again, I expect demand to exceed packing capacity. The advantage is that transport availability is not an issue at the moment, because demand is so broad. For the second half of the season, there will again be great opportunities for Europe buying. Remarkably, many European countries are already buying now, which is very unusual," Lindert concludes.
For more information:
Lindert Moerdijk
MSP Onions
Deer road 32a
4455 TL Nieuwdorp
[email protected]
www.msp-onions.com