West Bengal is hopeful of achieving self-sufficiency in onion production by 2021. The State had produced around 7 lakh tonnes of onion in 2019. It is hopeful of achieving 21 per cent growth in production to 8.5 lakh tonne by 2021.

“We are hopeful of achieving production of 8-8.5 lakh tonne by 2021, which is the estimated consumption of the State. However, it will depend on favourable weather conditions,” Pradip Kumar Mazumdar, Chief Advisor, State Agriculture department, told newspersons on the sidelines of the agm of WBCSA here on Tuesday.

Onion prices had touched a historic high of ₹140-160 a kg in the last quarter of 2019 on account of unseasonal rain in key producing States of Maharashtra and Karnataka. It was commanding anywhere between ₹100-140 a kg across various retail markets of Kolkata and its outskirts in early December. West Bengal is not a major producer of onion and has to depend on States like Maharashtra for meeting its demand. The West Bengal government is also planning to provide support to investors for setting up a 50,000-tonne cold storage for onion in Bengal.

“There are no cold storages for onions at present and that is what led to this current problem. We hope this project to commence by 2021,” he said.