The northern onion harvest is around 5-6 weeks from being packed, with the crops so far showing little or no signs of mildew or onion thrip pressure, according to Michael Sippel, of Terranova Seeds. “The weather’s just starting to warm up. All the crops I’ve looked at are looking very healthy,” he said.
The industry is predicting national volume to be similar to the ABS data from 2014, at 256,000 tonnes, including onions grown in the southern states and kept in storage.
Mr Sippel said it is too early to predict harvest volumes this season. “Onion thrip can start to get more active, so right now is when we desperately want rain. If you get a wet weather harvest you will get a higher yield, but you can end up having to throw product out because it can go bad.”
During the next five weeks growers will have to get more serious about irrigating their crops if the rain doesn’t come to Queensland, Mr Sippel said.
There are also a couple of new onion varieties, including an ‘early harvest’ version of the Lucinda variety in the pipeline. “Most of my major growers have got trials of that in the ground. Growers are certainly looking for earlier genetics,” said Mr Sippel. “The early Lucinda will push aside the Taipan variety, because it will help with guaranteed supply to the supermarkets by the first week of November.”
In terms of consumer preference, Mr Sippel said shoppers are more interested in buying smaller or medium sized onions, for single use as a pre-pack product. “Bigger sales are certainly coming from smaller to medium sized onions. When I was a kid 20kg bags were the norm, now it’s 1-2 kilo bags, and the supermarket wants a barcode,” he said. “It also means growers have to purchase new equipment to pre-pack those bags at great expense.”
All in all Mr Sippel said that the onion industry is bouncing back from issues with botrytis virus that started five years ago.
For more information
Michael Sippel
Terranova Seeds Australia
Phone: +61297251088
Website: www.terranovaseeds.com.au