Prices for new season garlic are low, this is due to a large amount of last year's crop still in storage (130,000 tons) and yields are also up on last year. Harvesting started on 22 May.
According to Vivien Li from Heng Feng the size of the garlic bulbs is larger than last year, with few smaller than 4.5cm, 50% are 5.0-5.5cm and 30% are 5.5-6.0cm. "At present we estimate the increase of total yield at around 20% at least, in some sub-areas the production may increase 30%. The quality is very good especially in garlic sub-areas and new planting areas."
Some early harvested wet garlic has already been sold in the markets and the price is low. Li points out the similarity with the trend of 2011. "While the new garlic gets drier and drier, the price won’t see a big increase or even decrease this season as long as there are no special circumstances on the garlic market such as the actions of some big speculators and the garlic stock market."
On the other hand, garlic used for dehydration will be in great demand. The dehydrated garlic storage is less than 20,000 tons in the whole of China. Each year China export around 150,000 tons. It is estimated that one million tons of small size garlic will be used to produce dehydrated garlic this season.
This season should be a good year for garlic import. The export volume of Chinese garlic is estimated to increase by 30% against that of last year due to the low price and good quality.
For more information:
Vivien Li
Hengfeng Fresh Produce Co., Ltd
Tel: +86 530 8275988
Mob: +86 182 540 55579
Fax: +86 530 8191288
vivien@hengfengfresh.com
www.hengfengfresh.com
