Madagascar’s authorities have restored a floor price on green vanilla ahead of the 2026-27 export campaign, setting a minimum farm-gate price of 10,000 ariary per kilogram, around 2.30 US dollars at an exchange rate of roughly 4,500 ariary to the dollar in early October, according to TradingEconomics data. The measure, introduced under Order No. 18280/2026, opened the new buying season in the Sofia, Diana and Anosy regions on 29 May, with implementing circulars expected to follow before the end of the year, according to the trade outlet Capmad.
The reinstated floor marks a reversal of policy more than two years after Madagascar liberalised its vanilla export market and scrapped the previous minimum export price in 2023, a move intended to let farm-gate values respond directly to global demand. Officials have not offered a detailed public rationale beyond describing the floor as part of a shift towards more active government involvement across the vanilla value chain, but the timing coincides with a period of sustained downward pressure on world prices.
Extraction-grade vanilla is currently averaging around 30 US dollars per kilogram internationally, a level last seen in 2012-13, as large inventories and a bumper Malagasy harvest weigh on the market. Grade A vanilla of 16 centimetres or longer is quoted between 140 and 260 US dollars per kilogram free-on-board at the port of Toamasina, a wide range that reflects how unevenly the price collapse has been felt across quality grades. In July, buyers in the SAVA region, Madagascar’s main vanilla-growing area, were reported paying as much as 23,000 ariary per kilogram for organic green vanilla, while other buyers offered only 10,000 to 11,000 ariary, underscoring how far farm-gate prices had already diverged before the new floor took effect.
Vanilla remains a cornerstone of Madagascar’s export economy, accounting for roughly 9 per cent of the country’s goods exports in 2024, according to figures reported in the Malagasy press. Cloves, the island’s other major cash crop, made up a further 8 per cent of exports that year and are trading at around 5.85 US dollars per kilogram, down 6 per cent on the previous year, offering growers and exporters a partial buffer against the vanilla downturn. Lychee, a smaller but still significant export earner, faces growing competition from South African producers for European market share during its own export window.
Exporters contacted by Malagasy trade media said they were weighing a mix of long-term vanilla supply contracts, clove revenue and the timing of lychee shipments to manage cash flow through the depressed vanilla market, rather than relying on any single crop. Whether the restored floor price will hold up remains uncertain: Madagascar’s last attempt at a mandated minimum export price was abandoned in 2023 after enforcement difficulties and complaints from exporters that it priced Malagasy vanilla out of a market increasingly supplied by lower-cost producers in Uganda, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. This report relies on a single Malagasy trade publication for the floor-price figures, and independent confirmation from Madagascar’s agriculture ministry had not been published as of the time of writing.
For smallholder growers in the SAVA region, who typically sell green vanilla soon after harvest rather than holding stock to wait out a price cycle, the gap between the new 10,000-ariary floor and the higher prices some organic buyers were already paying in July suggests the policy may matter less to better-connected farmers than to those selling into more commoditised, lower-grade channels where buyers have greater room to undercut.
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