Published :
Updated :
For all latest news, follow The Financial Express Google News channel.
Price slump at its lowest for some winter vegetables has raised the old question of troubles and travails farmers often undergo. Oversupply of perishable fruits and vegetables compared to demand has ever remained a problem in this country. If a kilogram of radish fetches only Tk1.0 and a full-size cauliflower Tk3.0-5.0, as reported in the media, the growers have to count heavy losses. During the early harvest, radish used to sell at Tk30-40 a kilo and a cauliflower for Tk70-80. The price fluctuation surpasses even the consumers' imagination.
Intriguingly, the difference between prices of the same item now in an urban centre like Dhaka and the agricultural belts in the northern districts is atrociously wide---no less than 10 to 15 times. Even the two most common vegetables--- potato and onion---that made screaming newspaper headlines during the past couple of years have witnessed plummeting of their prices. Let it be remembered for record's sake that potato had also suffered the worst possible price debacle for over a decade. In disgust farmers and stockists even did not take out their stocks of potatoes from cold storages or if they did, they either left those to rot or used as cattle feed.
In the past two years, even potato cultivators received reasonable prices even though the real beneficiaries of the record high prices of potato were big businesses or stockists. Yet potato and onion, two most common kitchen items that are perishable but unlike the leafy and flowery vegetables can be stored round the year, have remained an enigma during that time. Courtesy of the hoarders who procure these two must items, take full advantage of a fluid market in the absence of monitoring and enforcement of legal provisions to hike prices at their sweet will.
Now that potato and onion prices have dropped to Tk 30 and Tk50 respectively in the city's retail market with a sure sign of further dip in the peak harvesting period, rest assured in the lean season the consumers will have to pay at the last year's record rate of Tk 80-85 for a kilogram of potato and the highest, but not record, price of Tk150 for a kilogram of onion. This is likely to happen even though the acreage of potato cultivation has increased from 0.457 million hectares in 2023-24 to 0.521 million hectares in 2024-25, registering a 14 per cent increase in acreage. Onion acreage has also gone up to 4,000 hectares from 2,700 hectares.
Potato now sold in urban retail market at Tk 30-35 fetches less than half the price for farmers at the field level in the potato-growing northern districts. The vegetable is disposed of at the lowest Tk 12 a kilogram. Only 3.0 per cent of the popular vegetable got harvested by Tuesday last. There is no reason why the crop will not witness a further slump during the peak harvesting period. This is indeed a cause for concern. Farmers will incur heavy losses if they have to sell potato below Tk 20 a kilo. Contrast this with the crisis of potato a few months before when the authorities were compelled to import it from India.
The country, according to the Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE), has a demand for 0.90 million tonnes. Although there are discrepancies in production figures as provided by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics and the Bangladesh Cold Storage Association (BCSA), the production over the past two years is thought to be slightly more than 1.0 million tonnes. This year the production is expected to exceed the past year's yield. Ironically, the country's cold storages have a capacity for only 0.45 million tonnes. Evidently, small farmers have no chance of accessing the cold storage facility with the charge for storing marking a rise by Tk1.0 from Tk7.0 to Tk 8.0 for each kilogram. This will be an opportunity for stockists to procure potato at a throw-away price and seize the opportunity for market manipulation in the lean season.
Onion now available in the market and known as 'muri kata peaj' (onion with its tip slashed) cannot be preserved in cold storages. For storing, a three to four months' wait is a must. Whatever may be the expansion of acreage of onion cultivation or however much the bumper production may be, the same problem of storing, as of potato, frustrates its rational use. Its waste is far more than potato. This explains why the country has to import onions despite more production than it requires.
In this context the protestation by a DAE official is rather revealing. His contention is that farmers ignored their advice to go for potato cultivation in the hope of high price for their produce. Before accusing farmers, he would better have made a comprehensive assessment of the prevailing situation. The situation demands expansion of cold storage capacity for both potato, onion and other vegetables on the one hand and processing facilities for some of those. Since cabbage, cauliflower, beans, eggplants, tomatoes have a supply glut around this time of the year, prior arrangement for export of these popular items can be made. Potato is certainly a better candidate in this respect.
Indifferent to farmers' welfare, successive governments have given scant thought to such a move. The DAE could pursue the matter in order to bring about a collaborative drive for export. But before making it happen there is a need for streamlining the entire production and supply system under a strict regime matching the international standard.