Cabbage oversupply drops farm price as retail prices soar

Bulgarian cabbage growers face severe financial losses as overproduction drives wholesale prices down to 0.30 leva per kilogram, roughly half the production cost, while retail chains sell the vegetable for up to 1.29 leva. Ivan Kaburov, deputy chairman of the Bulgarian Association of Greenhouse Producers and a farmer from Malo Konare in Pazardzhik region, attributes the surplus to last year’s drought-driven price spike of 0.80 leva that encouraged expanded planting.

Kaburov emphasized that producers see minimal profit despite the retail markup and renewed calls for the stalled Agri-Food Chain Act to regulate pricing disparities. The farmer announced his family will suspend heated greenhouse operations this winter due to expensive sunflower husk pellet fuel, absent government energy subsidies, and competition from Turkish and Albanian imports treated with chemicals banned across the European Union. Production will resume on March 1 to reduce heating expenses while avoiding potential bankruptcy from unsustainable market conditions.