THE Department of Agriculture (DA) on Monday said it is closely monitoring the supply of red onions as the prices went up as much as P300 per kilo.
Based on their monitoring, Agriculture Assistant Secretary Kristine Evangelista said red onions were sold at around P280 to P300 per kilogram.
“In our monitoring, we noticed a spike in the price of red onion. There are P280 and we even found P300 a kilo. So now, we are asking the Bureau of Plant Industry to see the supply situation so we can know what is the reason for the price spike,” said Evangelista at the Laging Handa public briefing.
“We are waiting for the inventories from the Bureau of Plant Industry from cold storage facilities…But while we are doing that, the
public can avail [themselves of] onions at P170 at our Kadiwa stores,” she added.
Evangelista said the government has yet to consider importing red onions because of the expected harvest in December.
“They [farmers] said they have a harvest in December. We will look at the volume because that will help increase supply,” she said.
“Within the week, we will have an inventory situation … That will definitely help our supply situation,” she said.
In August, the DA told lawmakers that the Philippines is projected to suffer this year a shortage of key ingredients in making Filipino dishes, such as white onion and garlic, as total supplies, even with imports, are insufficient to meet overall demand for the commodities.
The DA projected that the country’s onion supply this year would be more than enough to meet total demand.
The DA estimated that total supply, including imported volume, would be at 343,427 metric tons (MT), more than enough to meet 288,344 MT total demand.
The country will end the year with an ending stock of 26,828 MT of onion, sufficient to last for 37 days.
Image credits: Nonoy Lacza