The Importance of Bulk Markets
Tim Hammerich
News Reporter
Canada has become a world leader in the trade of pulse crops like peas and lentils. Mercantile Consulting CEO Marlene Boersch has watched the rise in volume of these commodities over the years, and says a key inflection point was when the industry was able to enter bulk markets.
Boersch… “ I think a huge milestone was entering the bulk markets. We are still talking agricultural markets, so price sensitivity is extremely important. In fact, I was the first person who shipped bulk lentils into Columbia. That's not something we still do actually. There we go containerized, but we send the vessel from Vancouver into Guana Ventura at the time in bulk. And there the trick was to figure out how you actually move it, from spout to spout without harming the quality. And the whole idea of the exercise was how much money can you save by going the bulk way while preserving the quality? Of course we have moved on from that, but I think our ability to conceive and move things in bulk benefited us inland because it's easier to move through the elevators, gave us a different price point and made us very competitive, particularly through the west coast. So I think that was a major landmark.”
Boersch shared this and more context on pulse crop markets on the Growing Pulse Crops podcast.
