BONGABON, Nueva Ecija – Paid P40 per 30-kilo bag of harvested white onions, Ben Manalang joins planters in praying that the prices of bulbs would not slide down any further Wednesday.
Manalang and some members of his family were among some 60 people from Pantabangan town who went to Barangay Vega in this town for the harvest season. Their job included uprooting onions and cutting the leaves.
Manalang said the P40 per bag on Wednesday was far better than less than P30 during the last season but lower than P150 over a week ago at the onset of harvesting.
“Nuon pong mahal,” he said. For red onions, which farmgate prices was placed at P210 to P220, harvesters were paid P100 per bag. “Sana ay ‘wag nang bumaba (ang presyo ng sibuyas) para mas maganda po.”
Carlos Ison, an onion farmer in Barangay Vega here, said farmgate prices of yellow onions slid down to P40 to P50 a kilo a far cry from the P100 a kilo they were hoped with which to regain the losses last season.
“Meron (profit) naman ko kahit papano,” Ison said. “Huwag naman sanang bumaba pa.”
But the erratic prices of onions in the market also result to losses of some small traders, said Jun Lasiste who came all the way from Pampanga province to buy small volume in this town Wednesday.
“Baka sakaling makabawi kahit konti,” said Lasiste, a resident of San Fabian, Pangasinan, who claimed having lost in his last stint.
Lasiste said he bought yellow onions for P110 a kilo in Bayambang, Pangasinan last Friday but had to sell at P90 a kilo somewhere in Pampanga on Monday.
“Meron pang P60 ang kilo sa Pampanga,” he said.
A trader who contracted Ison’s harvest at P45 a kilo was asking P50 a kilo or a markup of P5 a kilo from Lasiste as the latter appealed for 30 bags.
Lasiste intends to sell the bulbs in La Union on weekend.
