The government on Saturday notified the Minimum Export Price (MEP) of $800 per tonne (free on board) on onion export from Sunday, valid until December 31, 2023. The MEP is likely to help maintain sufficient availability of onion in the domestic market to keep prices under check, the consumer affairs ministry said.

The government wants onion to be made available to domestic consumers at affordable prices, for which there was a need to curb the number of shipments after it was observed that the stored rabi 2023 season’s onion is declining fast, a senior official said, adding at $800 per tonne, onion below ₹67/kg will not be allowed to be exported.

In a notification, the Directorate General of Foreign Trade said that where onions consignment has been handed over to the Customs before this Notification and is registered in their system/where onions consignment has entered the Customs station for exportation before this Notification and is registered in the electronic systems of the concerned Custodian of the Customs Station with verifiable evidence of date and time stamping of these commodities having entered the Customs Station prior to the issuance of this Notification shall be allowed to be exported. But such consignments have to be shipped by November 30.

It also said that the export duty paid before issuing this Notification is non-refundable. After the imposition of MEP, the exporters will not be required to pay export duty of 40 per cent, which was imposed in August that led to traders’ strike in Nashik and some other places of Maharashtra, the official said.

Buffer stock procurement

Besides, the government has also asked cooperatives Nafed and NCCF to procure an additional 2 lakh tonnes (lt) of onion for the buffer, over and above the 5 lt already procured, the ministry said in a statement.

Onion from the buffer has been disposed of continuously from the second week of August in major consumption centres all over the country, and also supplied to retail consumers at select places at Rs 25/kg through mobile vans operated by NCCF and NAFED. So far, about 1.70 lt of onion has been disposed from the buffer, it said.

Diwali season stock infusion

“The continuous procurement and disposal of onion from the buffer are undertaken to moderate the prices for consumers while ensuring remunerative prices to the onion farmers,” the ministry said. The government would infuse more stocks in November during the Diwali season in the wholesale and retail markets to check on any price spikes due to higher demand, Consumer Affairs Secretary Rohit Kumar Singh said on October 26.

Onion prices in the national capital region, as well as many other big cities in the north, have increased 25-50 per cent after the end of the Navratri festival in 10 days. Onion is now sold at ₹60-70/kg in the retail market.

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