India has exported 1,43,000 tonne of onions during January-May to check the fall in domestic price of the commodity, which has witnessed a bumper production, Alok Ranjan, managing director, National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation, said on Monday. India is exporting onions at $150-200 a tonne on cost and freight basis, he said. | |
| "So far, we have exported 1,43,000 tonne. Around 50,000 tonne were exported in April and 60,000 tonne in March, to prop up prices which had touched as low as Rs 2 a kg in the wholesale market," Ranjan said. |
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| India is currently exporting onions to Dubai, Sri Lanka, Singapore, and Mauritius. |
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| To arrest the drastic fall in prices, Nafed procured onions at Rs 300 a quintal, which was much higher than the prevailing price of Rs 270 a quintal, he said. |
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| "Traditionally, onion prices fall during April and May and start rising during September and October," he said. "Our idea to procure and sell overseas during March-April was to stop the fall in prices." |
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| He said Nafed has procured 2.4 million tonne of onion so far compared with 8,00,000 tonne last year. |
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| India produces about five to six million tonne of onion annually. |
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| Onion production during this rabi season was four million tonne, a rise of about 15 per cent over last year's level, he said. |
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| In India, rabi or winter crops are sown during October-December, while harvest begins in March and ends April. |
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| Kharif or summer crops are sown from May. |
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| Onion being a sensitive commodity, both a sharp rise and a subsequent drastic fall in prices in the recent times, have led to political upheaval. |
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