IN Brief:
- FTI is urging private buyers to help absorb onion supply in Occidental Mindoro.
- Prices paid by participating buyers are running above prevailing farmgate levels.
- Storage and logistics limits remain the central constraint.
Food Terminal Inc. is seeking broader private-sector buying support for onion growers in Occidental Mindoro as harvest pressure, weak farmgate pricing, and limited storage capacity put the market under strain.
The state-backed processor and logistics group has said private buyers already involved in the intervention have procured around 6,000 bags at P32 to P35 per kilo, compared with prevailing farmgate pricing of about P22 per kilo. With production costs estimated at P18 to P24 per kilo, pricing has already moved close to, or below, break-even for some growers.
The larger problem sits in post-harvest handling. FTI has put logistics to cold storage in Nueva Ecija at roughly P8 per kilo, taking the effective cost into the P40 to P43 range. Mindoro’s eight cold-storage facilities can absorb only a small share of the projected harvest, and even planned expansion would still leave a large portion of the crop exposed to rapid quality decline.
That turns a farm-market story into a processing and storage issue. Onion shelf life remains limited even under ideal conditions, and the scale of this year’s crop means procurement alone cannot stabilise the market unless cold-chain capacity, grading discipline, and onward movement improve at the same time.