Garlic market enters a downturn this year, and next year's market remains far from optimistic

The 2019 garlic market is highly likely to be better than this year, but expecting garlic prices to climb sharply next year and return to the "garlic you ruthless" state of past years is still unrealistic. Oversupply in this year's garlic market has become a foregone conclusion, and coupled with the improvement in cold storage technology in recent years, storing this year's garlic until next year will probably not be difficult either. Even if this year's garlic planting area is somewhat reduced, it will still deal a considerable blow to next year's garlic. Although the probability of price increases is high, the profit-making capacity remains relatively weak.

Next year's garlic prices will be higher than this year's

This year garlic prices have entered a ten-year trough. Looking at garlic trends in recent years, garlic prices twice hit new highs, in 2009-2010 and 2015-2016, and after hitting those high prices, prices also entered a period of fluctuation and then subsequently fell into a trough. After the 2007-2008 trough, it took two years to emerge from the rebound, and after the 2011-2012 trough, it also took two years to emerge from the rebound. Therefore, judging from historical trends, prices will rebound somewhat next year, but not to the extent of a strong rebound.

Because garlic farmers generally suffered losses this year, garlic farmers' garlic planting area will certainly decrease next year, and this year's severe market oversupply will also be greatly improved, at least better than this year. Therefore, next year's garlic prices being better than this year's is inevitable.

Price increases will be limited, and profit-making capacity remains relatively weak

Although expectations for improved garlic prices next year are strong, the profit-making capacity remains relatively weak. Due to severe oversupply of garlic last year and this year, it will probably be difficult to fundamentally change the supply-demand pattern of next year's garlic market. A situation of supply-demand balance or a slightly tight supply-demand pattern can be anticipated.

Thanks to improvements in cold storage technology, at the time of this year's garlic harvest, the market was still selling last year's old garlic, dealing a relatively large blow to this year's garlic market and directly causing garlic prices to continue declining at this year's harvest. And this situation will probably continue next year, meaning next year's garlic will still face the market impact of this year's garlic.

Expand planting cautiously

Based on the above analysis, the recommendation of Science for Agriculture is to expand planting cautiously. For an economic crop like garlic, market fluctuations are indeed much greater than for grain. As the saying goes, wealth is sought in risk, and many farmer friends hold this mindset to gamble on next year's market conditions. Today, when the current garlic market mechanism is still not mature enough, we still hope everyone can view the issue rationally and avoid following the crowd.

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