07 October 2022, New Delhi: Onion farmers have been battling drastically low prices since last 2 months. Prices across the major onion growing states like Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat have remained as low. Average Onion wholesale prices in Madhya Pradesh remained is at Rs 856.41/quintal in the 1st week of October and was Rs 698.06/quintal in September 2022.
AT the same time Maharashtra saw a marginally higher rate of Rs 1356.84/quintal in the first week of October 2022 which was Rs 1106.5/quintal last month in September 2022.
Why prices of onion will not rise
In the last three years, the area under onion has increased by more than 20%. The production in the year 2021-22 was about 31.70 million tonnes which is an increase of 20% over last three years.
At the same time there has been tremendous upgradation in the storage infrastructure for the crop. There is ample amount of crop stored as well being harvested from the current season. Experts believe that the prices will remain low since the onion cropping area has not seen any major pest or disease which used to lower the production earlier. Now there are more number of onion farmers in India as compared to 5 years ago and also there are better storage infrastructure. A similar low price is prevailing in the export market as well which is another reason for lower price in domestic market.
