MUMBAI: In response to the decline in onion prices, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde said on Monday, March 13, that the state would pay onion growers Rs300 per quintal in compensation. The Chief Minister made the statement in the Maharashtra Assembly during the ongoing state budget session.

Farmers of the common kitchen vegetable are in trouble due to falling onion prices at Nashik's Agricultural Product Market Committee (APMC), the biggest wholesale onion market in Asia.

The price of onions was a major discussion point during the budget process. In the background, Chief Minister Eknath Shinde today stated in the Legislative Assembly that troubled onion producers in the state will receive compensation of Rs300 per quintal.

The growers, who had disrupted the APMC auction last week for a day, were furious when the price per kilogram of onion dropped from Rs 2 to Rs 4 last week.

The country's onion production is predicted to increase to 318 lakh tonnes in the crop year 2022–23 (July–June) from 316.98 lakh tonnes the year before.

There are onion farms in every state. Nonetheless, Maharashtra leads the nation in production with a share of about 43%, followed by Madhya Pradesh with 16% and Karnataka and Gujarat with 9% each. It has three harvesting seasons each year: Kharif, Late Kharif, and Rabi.

The most crucial time to harvest rabi onions is between March and May because this period accounts for between 72 and 75 percent of the country's total output. Because the rabi onion has a longer shelf life, it is kept.

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