Apart from imposing additional duty on onion exports or completely banning exports, the Government of India takes some other steps to control the onion price. One of them is storing onions in large quantities and selling them at lower prices during times of crisis. The Government of India has a fund, the Price Stabilization Fund (PSF), for this purpose.
Under this fund, the Government of India purchases 300,000 tonnes of onion from farmers at fair prices and stores it for a significant period of time. Since onion production declined this year, the government there purchased an additional 200,000 tonnes of the kitchen item and is selling it at Rs 20 per kg. 25 per kg.
The government of Bangladesh does not seem to be as active as the Indian government in controlling the price of onion. Some activity has been seen by the National Directorate of Consumer Rights Protection imposing fines on hoarders following the sudden increase in onion prices but it has little impact on the market.
While the Indian government is taking one step after another to curb exports in view of the decline in onion production, the Bangladesh government has shied away from giving permission to traders to import onions.
Far from creating its own onion storage system like India, the government did not even monitor whether the traders imported onions on time after getting permission or whether they sold the imported onions in the market at the right price. . The result was that this year the onion imported from India at a lower price was sold in the country’s market at three times the price.
Although the government had allowed traders to import 13 lakh metric tonnes of onion in June, till June they imported only 3 lakh metric tonnes. On this issue, Agriculture Minister Abdur Razzaq said, farmers in Dhaka still have onion stock. In such a situation, even if India imposes 40 percent levy on onion export, there will be no impact on the market.
Although the price has increased due to tax, it will come down soon. Efforts will be made to import onions from Türkiye, Egypt and China.
Not being able to import onions on time, thus showing adequate onion production and stock and not getting any positive results, importing after the crisis deepens is not a new thing.