Consumers may well have to face a hike in onion prices again soon. The rates of good grade onions at Lasalgaon, India’s biggest wholesale market, have gone up to R1,400 per quintal in the last couple of days because of unseasonal rains which have damaged crop in the region. Wet and poor grade onions are being sold in Lasalgaon at R200-300 per quintal, senior officials at Lasalgaon Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) said. ?
Prices are likely to go up at the onset of the monsoon since there will be less storage in the market this year, according to Nanasaheb Dattaji Patil, chairman, Lasalgaon APMC. ?This year, there has been a lot of variation in seasonal climate which has affected the onion crop badly. With lesser storage, a price rise in inevitable,? he pointed out.
At present, although arrivals have not been affected, the grade of the onions has been affected and, therefore, prices vary from R300 per quintal to R1,400 per quintal, he added. Moreover, farmers this year increased cultivation area in expectation of a good price for their produce, but all that has come undone because of the unseasonal rains and hailstorms, he said.
?Since Gujarat and Rajasthan were the only states that were unaffected by rain, it all depends on the crop from there ? whether it can compensate for the damage caused in Maharashtra,? Patil said.
Much of the rabi crop, 14 lakh tonne, is stored in Maharashtra. About 8-9 lakh tonne of this is in Nashik district.
According to RP Gupta, director, National Horticulture Research and Development Foundation, there has been a price variation of R100-150 which is acceptable. The initial estimate given by the Centre was to the tune of 190 lakh tonne and even if around 14 lakh quintals of crop in Nashik has been damaged in the recent rains, there will not be much impact, he said.
Last year, total production was up to 168 lakh tonne. It all depends on whether the weather remains stable in June, July and August, he said.
Around 30% of the stock has been reduced but this could be compensated by the onions harvested in Gujarat, he said, adding that he was not entirely sure of a price rise in May.
Modal prices at Lasalgaon touched R850 per quintal on Monday with 21,000 quintals arriving in the market. The minimum price was R251 per quintal and maximum price touched R1,225 per quintal.