As prices soar, consumers opting for sauce instead of raw tomato

With prices surging 40%, consumers are also preferring dishes that don't require much of tomato, says an Assocham study

Demand of processed tomato sauce has risen by 40% in the last one month due to consumers’ rapid shifting to sauce from raw tomato to prevent impact of rising prices, an Assocham study finds.

Thus, the demand of tomato puree and ketchup has risen as people have curtailed use of tomato and prefer dishes which do not require much use of tomatoes, like lady finger or pumpkin etc, the study said.

Selling currently at Rs 100 a kg in retail markets, tomato price has doubled in the last two months due to supply shortage. Tomato availability remained scarce in major mandis in the last few weeks on low yields of rabi crop crops due to drought in major producing regions.

“A rise in the price of tomatoes has affected the budgets of families in the city. About 78% of households find difficult to manage their household budget and squeezing families' finances to the lowest level due to sudden rise in price of tomatoes, pulses,” said the survey.

During the last two seasons, the monsoon remained deficient resulting into low availability of soil moisture for tomato farming. Apart from that, incessant heat wave in the 2016 summer season burnt flower buds in the standing crops. According to Shri Ram Gadhave, President, Vegetables Grower Association of India, tomato yield has declined by 75% this year due to heat waves.

The government, however, continues with its earlier estimates of tomato output. As per the latest estimate, India’s tomato output is pegged at 18.28 million tonnes in the 2015-16 crop year (July-June) as against 16.38 million tonnes in the previous year. Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Odisha are the major tomato growing states.

The survey was conducted in major cities like Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad and Hyderabad involving over 1500 hosewives. The maximum impact was felt in Delhi-NCR followed by Mumbai, Ahmedabad. 

The rise in pulses price has come as a double-shocker for the consumers. Vegetables are increasingly becoming ‘unaffordable’ as the prices have skyrocketed particularly in metros and major cities, said D S Rawat, secretary general of Assocham.

Prices have gone up because of tight supply from the major growing states of the south where the rabi crop has been damaged during the flowering stage because of the severe drought, adds the paper.