Ontario green beans are underway and volume is coming on. “The supply of beans is starting to increase because more growers are coming on right now,” says Peter Streef of Streef Produce Ltd. in Princeton, Ont. “We’re currently harvesting our own green beans and we started harvesting last week from our farms around Burford, Ont.”
Ontario however went through a heat wave earlier this month and rain has been minimal in the province. “So the beans are a little bit smaller because we’re experiencing a mini drought right now. We really need rain as the yields are dropping per acre because it’s so dry. But the quality of the bean and the shelf life is excellent because of that lack of water.”
Overall, Streef notes that the volume of beans will be slightly up this season compared to last.
New crop welcomed
Meanwhile demand for the vegetable is consistent. “People are excited for new crop beans. There have been beans in Ontario now for over three weeks and they were grown under plastic so they can speed up the process. They were also hand-picked beans,” says Streef. Those beans were priced at $100 CDN/bushel, though that market has come down since and today they are going for $30-$40 CDN/bushel. “I think there’ll be a bit more pressure on the market but generally beans will settle in between $25-$30 CDN/bushel,” says Streef.
As the pricing comes down, that will also be when chain stores begin promoting local beans as well. “So we expect to see steady volumes over the next couple of weeks. Then as pricing gets into that range, that’s the target for promoting,” says Streef, who notes that generally Ontario beans are harvested until around the first of November or when the first frost hits.
