The Department of Agriculture will temporarily stop selling lower priced onions at its Kadiwa rolling stores starting Friday due to the absence of an effective memorandum of agreement (MOA) with suppliers.
DA Assistant Secretary Kristine Evangelista, said the mobile Kadiwa stores will temporarily stop selling onions worth P170 per kilogram (kg) as its MOA with suppliers expired on December 31, 2022.
Evangelista bared exploratory talks with the Food Terminal Inc. (FTI) to resolve issues prior to a supplemental MOA for Kadiwa to resume offering lower priced onions.
“The partnership with FTI, since they procured it, is a trading capital. A second cycle is something we have to study with them to see the amount to be purchased, and also the intervention needed because cost structures will be different,” Evangelista explained.
Evangelista said the DA wants to continue offering lower priced onions at Kadiwa outlets as long as retail prices stabilize. She also said the agency is exploring options in sourcing new suppliers the “soonest” and “most prudent” way possible.
Prior to this, the DA offered native red and white onions costing P170 per kg, with customers allowed to buy a maximum of three kilos at Kadiwa outlets.
Kadiwa stores have been selling P170 per kg onions since the issuance of DA Administrative Circular 9 dated October 7, 2022 which sets the suggested retail price of medium-sized red onions in National Capital Region (NCR) wet markets only at P170 per kg.
The native onions sold at Kadiwa outlets were supplied by farmers from Nueva Ecija, Pangasinan and Tarlac.
The monitoring of select wet markets in NCR by the DA on Thursday show the retail price of local red onion range from P340 to P550 per kg.
