Even if we had enough buffer stock, which we don’t, the Centre has no delivery mechanism. The only viable alternative is to create modern storage infrastructure, but who is interested in doing that?
It appears that it is the humble onion which is finally teaching urban India’s middle class of the perils of climate change. The deniers may still not want to believe it, but the current crisis of high onion prices may well be an early indicator of the shape of things to come.
Now that the retail price of onion continues above Rs 100 per kg, the government is on the back foot. And it is running out of options. There is not much that it can do, except wait for late kharif crop to hit the market.
As late as August 29, 2019, the Ministry of Agriculture estimated the production of onion in crop year 2018-19 (July-June) at 23.28 million tonnes, slightly more than last year’s production of 23.26 million tonnes.
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