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DA admits onion price 'gotten out of control', says importation only solution
DA admits onion price 'gotten out of control', says importation only solution
By Jel Santos
Admitting that the price of onion in the country has gotten “out of control,” the Department of Agriculture (DA) said importation of onion is the only solution to lower its skyrocketing prices in markets.
“Kung hindi ho masawata itong pagtaas ng presyo na ito, ang gagawin natin po ay isa lang po, we need a palliative or ang sinasasbi nating short term solution which is the importation of the commodity (If we would fail to stop the onion price increase, we only have one thing to do, we need a palliative or what we call a short term solution which is importation of commodity),” Assistant Secretary Rex Estoperez, deputy spokesperson of the DA, said during a “Laging Handa” briefing, Thursday, Jan. 5.
But he said that the DA is still weighing things in order to protect both the local farmers and consumers.
The agriculture official, however, did not mention when the onion importation order will be released should this only “band aid” solution pushes through.
According to Estoperez, the farmgate price of onion is not going down based on their close monitoring.
“Ngayon out of control na po 'yung presyo dahil sa palengke natin magmula po nang pumunta kami sa sibuyasan nang bago magpasko at nitong bagong taon, at ngayon nandito tayo sa sibuyasan ay hindi po bumababa ang farmgate price, nasa P300 pa rin...so mataas pa rin (Right now the price of onion is out of control because at our markets, since we went to sellers of onion before Christmas and this New Year, the farmgate price remains at P300, so it’s still high),” he said.
The official of the agriculture department said that such increase in the price of onion could have been avoided if smuggling have been stopped and no importations in order to protect local farmers during harvest season.
In the coming months, Estoperez said that the agriculture department will assess if where they had deficiencies.
On Dec. 30, 2022, the DA raised the suggested retail price or SRP of red onions to P250. But, this increase is still much lower than the prices of red onions currently being sold, soaring up to P720 per kilo in some markets.