National cauliflower production over the 2016-2017 season is stable compared to the year before. Planted acreage has decreased by 2% over the year and 7% compared to the five year average. According to Agreste, cauliflowers suffered from bad weather conditions in June 2016. This was followed by a lack of water and frost over the autumn and winter months. Cauliflower development was delayed.
Prices remained above the five year average thanks to a seasonal demand and lack of volume. Harvested volume in December started to get back to the norm for the season and prices fell until January when due to a reduced offer from a delay in cauliflowers reaching maturity, prices remained resilient.
Prices stopped increasing in February until March. Despite a large part of volume being frozen and an increase in unsold volume due to quality problems, the offer was abundant. Cauliflowers were declared to be in crisis. In April, marketed volume was purposefully limited and prices recovered slightly. They are almost at the same levels as the five year average (-4% below the average, rather than -47% in March).
