Helios Identified Colombian Banana Disruption Months Before Prices Skyrocketed
At a glance: Helios helped customers identify the Colombian banana disruption months before prices skyrocketed by 45%, showcasing the ability of the Helios platform to predict and identify supply chain disruptions before the rest of the industry.
What happened?
In January 2024, bananas from Colombia faced significant disruption due to heatwaves and drought, which caused a drop in production and exports. The price of bananas at the time was approximately $1.20 USD per kilogram. By July 2024, the price had surged to $1.75 USD per kilogram (a crushing 45% increase), which significantly impacted consumers, trading firms, and retailers.
How Helios Helps
As early as January 2024, our platform identified the growing risks across Colombian markets. Below is a dashboard for a supplier we were tracking in Sabanas de San Ángel, Colombia, a key banana-growing region.
As you can see from the graph below, Helios flagged the risk to the growing season at the earliest stages when the temperature became too hot (peaking at 106.6℉!) in January, five months before the media reported about it. With Helios, users informed of the heatwave much earlier than the rest of the market, they were better able to mitigate the risk by nailing down price agreements and finding alternative suppliers before the large jump in banana prices.
