This time in Pabna's Sujanagar, farmers have spent more on onion cultivation than any other year. Despite this, a record amount of land has been planted with onion in Sujanagar, Pabna. But the farmers are not able to raise the production cost by bringing the produced onion to the market.
Farmers claim that this time the production cost of onion per kg is Tk 26 to 29. But in the market they have to sell onions at Tk 20 to 22. Onion farmers in the region are frustrated with being deprived of a fair price for onions.
Sujanagar is the second largest onion producing and known as store house of onion in the upazila in North Bengal. According to the Upazila Agriculture Department, onion was planted in 16,500 hectares of land in Sujanagar last year but this time onion has been planted in 17,350 hectares of land in this upazila. Due to favorable weather and timely sowing of fertilizer seeds, farmers are able to harvest 80 to 90 maunds of high yielding seedlings and 100-120 maunds of hybrid seedlings per bigha of land. At present, onion import has been seen in various hats of the upazila including Sujanagar Municipal market.
Visiting the Sujanagar Municipal Market on Sunday, it is seen that onions are being sold at 800-900 manas per ounce. Altaf Hossain, a farmer from Mathurapur village, who came to sell onions at the municipal market, said that the amount of money spent on onion production, including their labor, fertilizers, poisons and grains, and the price at which they are now selling onions is huge loss.
He also said that if the price of onion is at least Tk 1,400 per ounce, then the farmers will be able to at least take their money home. Onion farmer Abdul Wahab said, "Our cost of onion cultivation is much higher this time than other years." Hope to make a good profit. But now the profit is far away, I can't raise the cost.
Badsha Hossain, warehouse keeper of Sujanagar Municipal market, said that at the current price at which farmers are selling onions, they are incurring huge losses. And if there is such a price, the farmer will be face a great loss.
Meanwhile, most of the onions in North Bengal are produced in Sujanagar upazila of Pabna but there is no system to store these onions. Therefore, the farmers have demanded the the concern authority to take necessary steps to preserve their onions.
Rafiul Islam, agronomist and agriculture officer of the upazila, said that most of the onions are produced in the larger Gajanar beel of this upazila and due to the huge demand for these onions, traders from different districts of the country including Dhaka come here to buy onions. Despite the high production cost, the farmers were more interested in onion cultivation this time. As a result, onion has been planted in more lands than the target.
