50,000 tonnes of Onions from the buffer stocks are to be offloaded to keep the price stable
About 50,000 tonnes of onions from the government’s buffer stocks will be sent to a few cities like Delhi and Guwahati, where retail prices are a little higher than the average for all of India. In order to keep the price of onions stable, the Centre keeps a buffer stock of 2.5 lakh tonnes of onions.
According to sources, the department of consumer affairs will sell 50,000 tonnes of onions from its buffer stocks to cities like Delhi and Guwahati.
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They also said that in many cities, prices are higher than the average for all of India. On Tuesday, the average price of onion in India was ₹ 26 per kg.
Since onions don’t last as long as other foods, the department wrote to all states, telling them to place orders if they need onions. Onions are sold at the Centre for about ₹ 18 per kg.
They also said that the department is looking into how to use the radiation process to make onions last longer. In 2020-21, 266.41 million tonnes of onions were produced, but only 160.50 million tonnes were used.
Due to the time between the Rabi and Kharif crops and the fact that onions go bad quickly, their prices tend to go up from September to December.
Overall onion losses after harvest are caused by a number of things, such as loss of moisture, fungal infection, decay, sprouting, etc., which can be reduced by making storage facilities better.
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To solve the problem of onions going bad after they are picked, the department is holding a hackathon/grand challenge for scientists, researchers, and startups to come up with ideas and build a prototype for storing onions after they are picked.
The challenge has four parts: improving the designs of storage structures, the pre-harvesting stage, primary processing and value addition, and making use of onion waste.
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