Garlic in Mexico is grown in multiple regions, each of which have their own growing window. The overall harvest window starts at the end of March and ends in July. Sergio Narvaez Ávila of Los Rancheros Mexico says: “We had good weather conditions in 2019 – it was dry without risk of rain, and this is really favorable for the garlic. This helped us have a great production and harvest season.”
Los Rancheros works mostly with the Chinese purple garlic, but also harvests good amount of both conventional and organic white garlic. Ávila says: “The Chinese purple garlic is our most popular variety. The violet variety (Taiwanese type) is grown in the Bajío area and is harvested at the end of March, so it is an early variety for us.”
This year, the company had a very good season. Ávila explains: “The markets were less saturated this year, and this helped the demand. Los Rancheros was able to provide good quality on our garlic which of course helped the demand as well for us specifically. The Mexican harvest starts earlier than some of our competing countries so that helps us get a head start in the markets.”
He adds: “This was a particularly prosperous year for us because of our quality, but also because the pricing, both nationally and internationally, was very good – much better than it was last year. The overall yields were higher than previous seasons too and we got better volumes of garlic per hectare which was mainly due to the good weather.”
The state of Zacatecas has the highest production of garlic, and produces about 3,000 hectares. Ávila says: “Throughout the whole country, approximately 6500 hectares of garlic is produced. On average we see a yield of 14,000 kilos of garlic per hectare. The majority of the Mexican volumes are all dedicated to the Chinese purple variety which is mostly destined for Brazil, the United States, and Australia.”
Ávila concludes: “While our main varieties are the Chinese purple garlic, and the white garlic, we also produce some black garlic. We also work hard to ensure that we are fully certified – we have the Global Gap certification, and are certified organic in Mexico, the U.S., and Europe. This allows us to operate globally and ensures that we are providing safe and quality products to our customers.”
