PH suspending onion tariffs to lower prices

The Department of Agriculture (DA) will ask the Bureau of Customs (BOC) to lift the special safeguard (SSG) duty imposed on onions as a means to lower its prices in the market and help ease inflation.

The SSG is an additional tariff that developing nations may impose on an agricultural commodity once it hits below a “trigger price,” which in the Philippines is P74.21 per kilogram for imported onions.

Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol on Friday said the SSG had raised the price of imported onions in the local market despite its current landed cost of about P33 a kilo—way below “trigger price.”

Following a consultation with industry stakeholders, the agriculture chief decided to temporarily lift the duty on imported onions to bring down retail prices.

Off season

The price per kilo of red and white onions rose to P120 and P100, respectively, this week. Compared to last year, the price is higher by 42.86 percent for red and 31.47 percent for white onions.

Piñol said he expected onion prices to go down in two weeks after the SSG was lifted.

“Local onion is currently in the off season right now, so imported onions must be cheaper with the lifting of the SSG,” he said.

Industry stakeholders see prices going down to P55 per kilo for white onions and P65 per kilo for red onions once the SSG is lifted.

“Hopefully, this would contribute to the reduction of the prices of prime commodities in the market,” Piñol said.

The volume to be imported has yet to be determined by the Bureau of Plant Industry.

Piñol, however, noted that the SSG would only be suspended for two weeks.

“It will last until I won’t be seeing any changes of the prices in the market,” he said. “That means if the retail prices of onion after two weeks upon the effectivity of this order will not go down, then we will reimpose the SSG.”