{"id":675922,"date":"2026-11-05T17:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-11-05T17:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/675922\/"},"modified":"2026-11-05T17:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-11-05T17:12:13","slug":"where-do-irish-onions-come-from-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/675922\/","title":{"rendered":"Where do Irish onions come from? \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A combination of climate<\/a>, cost and changing tastes means that the onions we consume in Ireland are increasingly likely to originate from the Netherlands<\/a> or Spain<\/a>. In 2024, 45,000 tonnes of onions were imported to the Republic. Ireland\u2019s self-sufficiency in the allium sits below 30 per cent, with three producers accounting for the majority of onions used in the State, according to Teagasc<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Even though the climate here is suitable for growing onions, a big part of producing them involves drying and storage, and that poses a challenge \u2013 and a cost. After harvest in July and August, onions go into the storage process, which involves first drying the outer skin with forced air, followed by refrigerated storage.<\/p>\n

Margin is also an issue: \u201cI think the onion market is pretty volatile, and you need to know what you\u2019re doing. You need high levels of investment in equipment and in storage,\u201d says Dermot Callaghan, head of horticulture with Teagasc.<\/p>\n

Growing onions, he adds, is not as easy as it may seem. \u201cIt\u2019s not something [where] you, as a vegetable grower, would turn around and say, \u2018Oh, next year I\u2019m going to move into onions\u2019. There\u2019s a lot to know about growing onions in terms of making money from it, and there\u2019s a lot of investment required.\u201d<\/p>\n

Storage facilities with a controlled atmosphere are crucial, and they are expensive to maintain. And business rates are a concern: in October, the High Court<\/a> ruled that a Cork<\/a> potato grower was liable to pay rates on storage facilities. The fear now is that the rates applied to storage will hit all growers. <\/p>\n

A third factor when it comes to onion consumption in Ireland is more discerning palates. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere used to be more growers when all we wanted was brown onions, but the consumer taste has evolved, and they\u2019re buying Spanish onions, smaller onions and red onions,\u201d says Emer Hall, senior manager of horticulture with Bord Bia. \u201cMy mother used to only cook brown onions; there was no other variety. Now people expect all varieties all year round.\u201d <\/p>\n

She notes, though, that climate dictates the varieties that can grow here, at least to an extent.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t really grow shallots, and we can\u2019t grow what you\u2019d call a Spanish onion, which is a very large mild onion,\u201d says Hall. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0The best foods to eat and what to avoid to get a good night\u2019s sleepOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Despite all this, Callaghan notes that supermarket buyers have recently looked towards more local production, partly because supply lines have been tricky. <\/p>\n

\u201cClimate is among the drivers. In southern Europe, the availability is not the same as it was 10 years ago, and it may be a little bit less consistent. There can be shortages in that supply chain from time to time due to weather or logistics, and we\u2019ve had a few shocks around Covid,\u201d he says. \u201cI think there\u2019s more of a focus by supermarkets to build longer-term relationships for local supply in Ireland.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A combination of climate, cost and changing tastes means that the onions we consume in Ireland are increasingly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":675923,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,2885,64500,13355,61,60,5151,2846,31615],"class_list":["post-675922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-climate-change","tag-food-month","tag-food-production","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-netherlands","tag-spain","tag-teagasc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=675922"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675922\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/675923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=675922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=675922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=675922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}