Farmers dump onions amid glut of imported bulbs

During the holiday season in 2022, the country saw an unprecedented onion crisis, with retail prices of the bulbs hitting an eye-watering P700 a kilo.

- Bella Cariaaso

The crisis was blamed partly on wrong importation policy that was not in sync with the local harvest.

This holiday season, the government is not taking any chances, and is flooding the country with imports. And local onion farmers are crying.

Onion farmers in Nueva Ecija have been forced to dump their produce as imported bulbs flood the markets, making them unable to sell their stocks.

In a radio interview yesterday, Lot Manibog, a farmer from Nueva Ecija, said the dumping of onions will persist as the bulbs are rotting in cold storage facilities because traders patronize imported white onions, even though the wholesale price of local and imported onions is the same.

Manibog said the Department of Agriculture (DA) allowed the early importation of white onions despite the availability of the local produce in cold storage facilities.

For his part, Agriculture Assistant Secretary and spokesman Arnel de Mesa maintained that Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. only approved a minimal volume of imported white onions to ensure enough supply during the holidays.