MANILA, Philippines —The government must provide more financial aid to onion farmers nationwide as a confluence of unfortunate events push down prices of homegrown produce, according to a group of rural workers’ advocates.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Federation of Free Farmers (FFF) lamented the decline of farm-gate prices in the major onion-producing provinces of Pangasinan, Nueva Ecija and Mindoro Occidental.

FFF national president Leonardo Montemayor appealed to state-owned agricultural insurer Philippine Crop Insurance Corp. (PCIC) “to be more proactive in extending crop insurance to onion farmers.”

Late arrival of imports

The group said the farm-gate price—or the selling price between farmers and traders hugely influenced by the latter—of onions have gone down to a low P10 to P50 per kilogram in Bayambang town in Pangasinan this month from about P300 to P400 per kg in January last year.

READ: DA suspends onion importation, says supply enough to meet demand

Back then, skyrocketing prices of the bulbs have been significant enough to influence inflation, or the overall increase in prices of goods and services that the average Filipino household buys.

The FFF attributed the nosedive in farm-gate prices to the late arrival of imports procured in December last year, compounded by widespread worm infestations and reduced irrigation arising from depleted water sources.

Traders are claiming that recent onion importation are causing them to buy local varieties from farmers at low prices,” FFF municipal chapter president Rodolfo Camacho said.

Army worms outbreak

“The outbreak of army worms called harabas, coupled with reduced groundwater levels caused by El Niño, are also affecting the size, quality and output of onions,” Camacho said.

READ: Lives destroyed as armyworms invade Philippine ‘onion capital’

Montemayor said that both the national and local governments should have anticipated the current glut in onion supply and readied measures to assist farmers in selling and/or storing their produce.

“Moreover, army worm outbreaks and the El Nino phenomenon are not new issues,” Montemayor, a former agriculture secretary, added.

The Department of Agriculture (DA) already halted the entry of onion imports until May “to prevent further depressing onion prices due to supply glut” and hinted the suspension could be extended to July.

As of writing, local red onion is sold from P100 to P190 per kg as of Wednesday, lower than P200 to P350 per kg a year ago, according to the DA’s price monitoring. Imported red onion retailed from P80 to P160 per kg.