ONION TEARS

The spiraling prices of onion has once again questioned the rationality of decision makers at Krushibhawan. The union Agricultural minister and the NAFED chairman are talking at cross purpose,with the former blaming it on the unseasonal rains and the latter denying it The fact of the matter is that onion has a very minimal share in our overall Agricultural production scenario.With just 10 million tonnes of production it is not considered as a major crop But the political overtones of this crop is immense. It is a fact that unseasonal rains and eratic weather conditions have created adverse situations for various crops including onion. But the Government never took people into confidence and gave a sense of misplaced optimism that everything is right. Infact the appreciatory trend has been visible since last two months But it allowed the situation to drift which gave ample time to the hoarders to have a field day The decision to ban export could have been taken a month back instead of now afterall onion export is notone of the priority area. But this sudden knee jerck reactions so very late in the day is further aggravating the already worsening situation.More importantly due to Global warming situation this indifferent pattern of behavior would be more regular in future times and our agri planners have to sit and find an effective solution not only to increase production and diversify agro products mix but also faster real time weather data,field situations and effective policy decisions accordingly.