The continuously soaring garlic prices this year finally fell back recently. Zhang, Manager of Jining Greenstream Fruits and Vegetables Co., Ltd. talked about the current market situation and future pricing developments.
"This year's harvest is good, as main production areas have not been affected by extreme weather. The quality has also improved compared with previous years. From February and March, farmers have generally improved planting management, so the yield per mu has increased by about 10%. The total acreages dedicated to garlic this year have decreased by 20% compared with last year, but overall production has been stable and supply has continued to increase."
“In general, prices this year have been about twice as high as those of the same period of last year. Prices for the new crop have kept rising ever since it became available in June and reached 8.4-8.6 yuan/kg by the end of June. From that point onwards, the market gradually stabilized and current prices fell to 5.4-5.6 yuan/kg ( size 5.0 raw material prices). We expect prices to keep falling in the next few weeks, but fluctuations will become increasingly small in the future,” said Zhang.
"In previous years, the old crop from the year before would usually be cleared by around May, but so far, there are about 200,000-300,000 tons of last year’s stock on the market this year. This is because prices soared in the late season last year and traders generally held to a wait-and-see attitude instead of making shipments."
“In terms of the sales volume, so far the local demand has been normal, and the overall sales volume in the market has stabilized at around 100,000 tons per month. Due to lasting high prices, the export volume last quarter was lower compared with previous years.
However, importers overseas are still purchasing from China, as garlic from other countries cannot replace the Chinese product in terms of quality, so this has not had a great impact on the industry. Although the import volume has declined, the overall sales value remains on the same level as last year due to the higher value."
"We were cautious and rational when prices were at their highest and didn’t follow others and make purchases blindly. It seems to have been the right move.” Zhang said.
In addition to garlic, Jining Greenstream Fruits & Vegetables Co., Ltd. also offers ginger, carrots, and onions.
More information:
Company: Jining Greenstream Fruits & Vegetables Co., Ltd.
Email: info@greenstream.cn