Tomato prices soar across Amritsar district due to dip in supply

Amritsar, June 28

Overnight downpour last week damaged the remaining standing crop of tomato in the fields surrounding the city, causing its retail prices to shoot up from Rs 10 to Rs 20 per kg over a week ago to Rs 50 to Rs 80 per kg.

For local tomato growers, downpour increased the tomato’s price from Rs 2 to Rs 4 per kg to Rs 20 to Rs 25. However, 80 per cent of the produce had already sold off and the quality of remaining 20 per cent got badly damaged in the rain.

Resham Singh, a grower from Bandala village, was surprised that nobody raised a voice in favour of farmers when they were selling the fresh farm produce at Rs 2 per kg. Now, when the crop has got damaged and its supply was just trickling in the wholesale market at Vallah, jacking up its price. It attracted the attention of all.

Today in the local market a kilogram of tomato is being sold between Rs 50 to Rs 80 per kg. The rate is invariably being decided by the quality of crop and the area where it is being sold.

Palwinder Singh, a retailer, said tomato grown in surrounding area of the city was available in the market but it was not being liked by buyers. Heavy shower and hails destroyed the crop, causing its price to go northward. So locally grown tomato of low quality is available in the market.

Paramjit Singh, wholesaler who normally deals in tomatoes, said whatever tomato crop was arriving in the market from the local fields it was damaged. Fine quality tomatoes have started coming from Himachal’s Solan. The price of the crop in the Hilly state was surging with the demand coming from the entire northern region.

He said this phenomenon happened every year that the rain brought end to the locally grown tomato. Then the crop comes from Himachal, then Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Gujarat. Sometime they have to buy it from Karnataka as well.