Low prices cast cloud of gloom over onion fest

BAYAMBANG, Pangasinan—Despite the crisis facing its onion industry this year, this central Pangasinan town is pushing through with the launching of its Onion Festival this month.

Mayor Ricardo Camacho said the activity was necessary to lift the morale of the town’s onion farmers who had incurred huge losses this harvest season because of low farm gate prices.

“There will be street dancing and games. But there will also be seminars for livelihood programs involving onions. So that during times like this, they will have alternatives,” said Camacho.

The festival will be held from March 23 to 28 and will involve the onion producing villages of Manambong Sur, Manambong Norte, Manambong Parte, San Gabriel II, Paragos and Iton.

This town is Ilocos region’s top onion producer, with 650 hectares of agricultural land in its southern villages planted to onions.

Camacho said farm gate prices of onions had not improved yet in the last three weeks. A kilogram of onions costs P8, he said, adding that imported onions are also flooding the market.

The current price is lower than last month’s buying rate of P10 to P13 a kg.

Camacho said he has set a meeting with onion growers in the town next week to discuss how they can minimize their losses and how the town government can help.

“This is the worst crisis to have hit our onion farmers so far,” he said.

Mercedes Peralta, the town’s agriculturist, said a farmer spends from P150,000 to P175,000 to produce 15 metric tons of onions from every hectare of farm.

For an onion farmer to break even, Peralta said, farm gate price of onions must be at least P20 a kg, and for a farmer to earn a little, the price should be P25 a kg.

“If the price range is from P35 to P50 a kg, that’s the normal. Our farmers really earn,” she said.

She said other farmers have opted to keep their harvests in storage facilities here and in neighboring Tarlac province and will sell them when the price gets higher. Gabriel Cardinoza, Inquirer Northern Luzon