Onions pricier; DA wants all warehouses checked
Personnel of the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) have been ordered to conduct an inspection of all onion warehouses nationwide after retail prices surged to more than P200 a kilo.
In a statement on Monday, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said the directive he gave to the BPI was aimed at determining if newly harvested supplies were being withheld from the market.
“Last Friday, I directed the Bureau of Plant Industry and its team to visit all the onion cold storage facilities across the country and inspect whether newly harvested onions are being kept there instead of being sold,” Tiu Laurel said.
“If they are, that’s wrong. Onions are typically stored toward the middle or end of the harvest season, not at the start. This clearly points to price manipulation—it’s hoarding,” he stressed.
The inspections to be conducted by BPI personnel are estimated to be completed within four to seven days, with a report expected by the end of the week, Tiu Laurel said.
Feb. 20 prices
Based on the price monitoring done by the Department of Agriculture (DA) in Metro Manila markets as of Feb. 20, red onions were being sold per kilogram from a low of P140 to a high of P240, as opposed to P90 to P120 per kg during the same period a year ago.
On the other hand, white onions were retailing per kg between P90 and P160, up from P60 to P130 previously in 2024.
“A month ago, the quoted prevailing price for red onions was at P140 per kilo, lower than the current P200 per kilo,” the DA noted.
It added that it had expected fresh supplies to come into the market starting this month, which could have helped ease rising retail prices.
Supply still limited
However, Tiu Laurel expressed concern that the newly harvested onions might not be reaching the market as expected.
The BPI had projected that the early harvest would add several metric tons of the produce to the available supply, bringing the total to approximately 33,000 metric tons (MT) by March.
Based on the BPI’s monitoring, red onion stocks stood at 34.87 MT as of Feb. 14 while the supply of yellow onions reached 257.09 MT.
It pegged the national monthly consumption at 17,000 MT for red onions and 4,000 MT for white onions.
Earlier this month, the DA authorized the importation of 3,000 MT of red onions and 1,000 MT of white onions to ensure ample buffer stocks while waiting for the start of the harvest season.
“We will not risk a potential shortage that unscrupulous traders could exploit to drive up prices as we saw in the past. We do not want a repeat of the 2022 crisis,” Tiu Laurel had said.
In 2022, the retail price of onions went up to a record high of P700 per kg due to a supply shortage that was aggravated by the delayed arrival of imports.
