In this installment of the ‘In Charts' series, Cristian Crespo of Agronometrics illustrates how the U.S. market is evolving. Each week the series looks at a different horticultural commodity, focusing on a specific origin or topic visualizing the market factors that are driving change.

The U.S. asparagus market has over the last 26 weeks been supplied mainly by Mexico and Peru, along with smaller supplies from the states of Michigan and Washington, as can be seen in the chart below. This has been the case for many years.

In this article, I will look more closely at the volumes and prices of Mexican asparagus in the U.S. market, and what has been happening over recent weeks.

Volumes (KG) of asparagus in the U.S. market, by origin

(Source: USDA Market News via Agronometrics. Agronometrics users can view this chart with live updates here)

Over the last several weeks, volumes of Mexican asparagus in the U.S. have been the highest in five years over that period.

This has coincided with a fall in supplies of Peruvian asparagus, exports of which have been affected since the 2017-18 season when the El Niño weather phenomenon hit the country. But Peru is expected to overtake Mexico as the leading asparagus supplier to global markets.

Volume (KG) of asparagus from Mexico in the U.S. market

(Source: USDA Market News via Agronometrics. Agronometrics users can view this chart with live updates here)

Meanwhile, prices have been the lowest in recent years over that period. In week 43 average reported prices were US$15.48 per box, compared to US$17 the previous year.

Average reported prices of asparagus in the U.S. market

(Source: USDA Market News via Agronometrics. Agronometrics users can view this chart with live updates here)

In our ‘In Charts’ series, we work to tell some of the stories that are moving the industry. Feel free to take a look at the other articles by clicking here.

You can keep track of the markets daily through Agronometrics, a data visualization tool built to help the industry make sense of the huge amounts of data that professionals need to access to make informed decisions. If you found the information and the charts from this article useful, feel free to visit us at www.agronometrics.com where you can easily access these same graphs, or explore the other 20 fruits we currently track.