The harvest of green peas has yet to begin, and early indications are showing that it may be a stressful one for producers.
Cam Laxdal of Lakeside Global Grains, said there are a lot of dirty crops in Manitoba, which could make for a challenging harvest.
“When there’s foreign material in there, it will thicken your canopy a bit, and there’s a bit more disease pressure from the vegetation, as opposed to a clean crop,” Laxdal said.
“The date of harvest will be affected by the weed pressure. It will be a much more difficult harvest,” Laxdal said.
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Laxdal said right now green peas are only about $0.25-0.50 per bushel higher than yellow peas, which is something producers aren’t happy about. He said farmers are usually looking for green peas to be about $1 more than yellows.
While the green pea market isn’t where most producers would like it to be, Laxdal said it could improve once the crop is harvested. “I think they will get better (prices). I think there is some handcuff demand for green peas that hasn’t materialized yet,” he said.
In most cases, green peas are exported to Brazil and South America, Laxdal said. However, there may be other opportunities for producers this year. “If the quality is poor and we end up with a lot of feed peas, we will end up with a lot more in Canada,” Laxdal said. “There’s some speculation that Europe will be looking for feed peas, so the feed pea prices may support the edible peas.”
