Onion growers in Australia are dealing with lower returns as competition from imported onions continues to stir up the market.
Onions Australia Chairman and grower Kees Versteeg says 2016 is the fourth consecutive year local growers have had to struggle against import competition despite strong yields and quality in Australia.
“Unnecessary imported red and white onions from the USA finding their way to Australian consumers through the Australian supply chain have contributed to price pressures for Australian red and white onions,” he says.
“Stories are that the last of the imported USA red and white onions are being sold off as low as $6.00 per 10kg bag or even lower just to get rid of them.”
Mr Versteeg also expressed concerns that sometimes the labelling of imported onions was unclear and misled consumers into thinking they were Australian.
He says this season has seen strong quality for Queensland and New South Wales growers, with South Australia and Tasmania just getting ready to start their main seasons.
“South Australia has already starting supplying some of their first onions in to the central markets,” he says.
Queensland onion grower Andrew Moon says growers in the state were significantly affected by imports, which then had a trickle-down effect for growers in other states.
“Queensland growers are the ones typically affected the most because the imported red and white salad onions land at the beginning of their harvest to try and combat a potential shortage – which now doesn't exist due to new technology and smarter farming practices,” he says.
“It does affect the whole industry though, there’s a snowball effect for other states because there’s always a backlog of onions.”
But awareness of the import issues is growing, with Onions Australia actively campaigning for change, and Mr Moon says he thinks things are improving.
“I think less came in this year than last year, and I think Onions Australia will put more pressure on imports because it does affect the whole industry.”
Mr Moon grows red, white and brown onions under the Moonrocks brand, supplying approximately 7000 tonnes per year. He says this season has been good for him in terms of both volumes and quality.
“We’ve had a really good season yield wise and quality wise. We missed a lot of weather that others dealt with – there’s been a lot of heatwaves in onion growing areas in South Australia and Queensland,” he says.
“I’d say there’s not an overabundance of brown onions on the market right now, but otherwise it’s all pretty good.”
He also says interest in exports is increasing, with some growers finding that they get “as good or better returns” than in Australia.
