Bumper crop in Pak pulls down India's onion exports

Good crop in Pakistan has dented demand for Indian onion, dragging the export of the farm item from this country down by about 24 per cent in July.

Worse still, the neighbouring nation is now exporting onion to Dubai and some other destinations, which had imported heavily from India in the last fiscal, pushing up its outbound shipment of the commodity to a record 1.76 million tonnes.

“India’s onion export in the last month declined to 130,000 tonnes, compared with 170,000 tonnes in the year-ago period, mainly due to a slump in demand from Pakistan,” said a senior official with Nafed, which oversees onion export.

Pakistan had imported 1,69,918 tonnes of onion from India last year after a failure of the crop. However, since it has harvested a good crop this year, it has not only cut down on its dependence on Indian onion but is also exporting.

Pakistan has purchased about 50,000 tonnes of onion from India so far this fiscal, though the import has virtually stopped since May-end.

“Demand from Pakistan dipped after May, affecting export even in June,” the official said.

Though India’s onion export so far this fiscal at 688,000 tonnes has exceeded last fiscal’s level of 619,000 tonnes, the dip in demand from Pakistan since May-end and its shipment to nations, which would otherwise have imported from India, pose a challenge.

Onion from the major growing region of Nasik is usually exported to Pakistan and some Gulf countries while that from the southern part of India is shipped to Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Singapore.

Meanwhile, Nafed has raised the minimum export price of onion by $20 a tonne to an average of $205-210 for August with a view to raising domestic supply and containing price rise.

Wholesale prices of onion shot up to Rs 581 a quintal as on July 31 in the country’s largest trading hub of Lasalgaon, compared with Rs 371 about three months ago.

In Delhi, the prices rose to Rs 760 a quintal from Rs 680 during the review period.