North American root crops are seeing a surge in demand at the retail level.
“We are seeing increased demand from our retail customers and more demand from new and existing customers expanding in the home-delivery space for root crops,” says Karina Sommerkamp with Gambles Produce in Toronto, Canada. “We’re definitely also seeing a transition to more affordable type commodities like potatoes, carrots and onions, whereas commodities like grapes, melons, and soft tree are declining in sales. We see this trend continuing as consumers adjust to this pandemic reality by making purchasing decisions based on the cost of goods. While many industries now are affected by lay-offs, it is uncertain what the long-term economic impact to consumers will be.”
Gambles, which recently relaunched its website, www.goproduce.com, sees the high-demand staples currently being carrots, onions and potatoes. “Supplies of these items are very steady for now,” says Sommerkamp. Carrots are transitioning from Ontario product (out of Bradford and Grand Bend, Ont.) soon to Mexican supplies while onions will continue to be sourced out of the same regions in Ontario until June or even July. Potatoes are coming from Bradford, Ont. as well as being imported from Prince Edward Island, Canada; Washington and Florida. New crop potatoes out of California will also start at the end of April or beginning of May. “New crop potatoes coming out of Florida have fluctuated in availability due to crop loss during the tropical storms in the growing season,” says Sommerkamp, adding that Gambles is seeing better quality product from farms overall this year compared to last year’s season thanks to improved weather and good yields during the fall harvest season.
Pricing up 
All of this has led to some price increases. “Prices are increasing as demand also increases for storage supplies. Potatoes are all harvested during the fall, and then stored in coolers/sheds. The longer you keep the potatoes in storage, the more costly it becomes for growers to store them,” says Sommerkamp. “Fortunately for farmers this year, due to the accelerated demand because of COVID-19, storage costs are not a big factor compared to previous years since sell prices are up.”
She does note that baking potato prices are decreasing in demand due to restaurant closures and that demand for foodservice-related products have stopped almost overnight.
That of course is quite different than what’s being seen at the retail level. “When consumers started panic buying during COVID-19, there was not enough product to go around, so prices naturally increased,” says Sommerkamp. “Then when most people had plenty of food reserve in their homes, prices capped. We are expecting demand and prices to continue to level off as growers, shippers, distributors and retailers all adjust to new volume levels.”
She adds that the challenge now is volume forecasting. “With the sudden impact on the foodservice sector, this is creating issues for everyone as we all adjust to minimize losses and keep product moving,” she says. “Another impact for us in Canada is pricing. Most of our products are imported and paid for in US funds. With the devaluation of our Canadian dollar, this has resulted in higher landed costs and ultimately higher prices for consumers. For instance, potatoes we are importing from Florida are costing us much more today than they did a month ago.”
For more information:
Karina Sommerkamp
Gambles Produce
Tel: +1 (416) 259-6397 ext. 7205
karina.sommerkamp@goproduce.com
www.goproduce.com
www.gofreshproduce.com