‘No smuggled onions in CDO’

MANILA, Philippines — The Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) has denied reports that smuggled onions are flooding the markets in Cagayan de Oro and that this has led to depressed prices.

Arnold dela Cruz Jr., BPI Region 10 chief, said Department of Agriculture monitoring showed that wholesale prices of local and imported red onions were between P50 and P65 a kilo. Prices for the imported white onions ranged between P65 to P70 per kilo.

These wholesale prices, Dela Cruz pointed out, would mean a retail price of between P90 and P170 per kilo for local red onion, P100 per kilo for imported red onion and between P90 and P180 per kilo for imported white onion.

He also cited a BPI report that showed 307.1 metric tons of local red onion and 17.6 metric tons of imported white onion arrived in the city in January. Another 302.8 tons of local red onion arrived this month.

“These local and import onions were sourced from Manila, Ilocos Sur, Ilocos Norte, Pangasinan and Nueva Ecija,” Dela Cruz said.

The BPI said it has coordinated with the Philippine National Police, National Bureau of Investigation and Bureau of Customs to verify reports that smuggled onions found their way into the province of Misamis Oriental.