After onions, now people will have to pay high price for tomatoes. Since last few weeks, tomato prices have seen a surge of around 70% in the National capital. People are facing a tough time in the festive season because of the price hike.
The prices of vegetables in Karnataka, Maharashtra and the northern part of the country have been rising due to several factors including heavy rainfall.
While the onion prices almost doubled in comparison to the rates at the same period last year, tomatoes so far, had remained more or less unaffected.
Tomatoes in Delhi & NCR is already being sold for Rs 40 to 60 in retail since past few days and prices are likely to increase further in the upcoming days.
Manju Singh, a resident of Noida said that because of the huge increase in the prices of onions & tomatoes, our kitchen budget has gone out of control. The modal price of tomatoes in the National capital was Rs 30 / kg but has now it has jumped to Rs 40 to 60 / kg.
Prices of tomatoes are not only increasing in Delhi but all across the country. According to the Central Consumer Affairs Department portal, price of onion in Chandigarh was Rs 52 / kg on Wednesday.
Today, a 25 kg sack of good variety tomatoes was sold at an average price Rs 800 in Azadpur Mandi, Delhi's wholesale market. Meanwhile, the average variety of tomatoes was sold for Rs 500 per sack.
As per the Azad Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) rate list, the wholesale price of tomatoes was Rs 8 to 34 / kg and 560.3 tonnes of tomatoes reached the wholesale market on Wednesday.
An official from APMC said that because of heavy rainfall and floods in Karnataka and Maharashtra, the quantity of tomatoes arriving went down to less than one-third. Moreover, tomato crop easily gets spoiled due to floods and for this reason the number of trucks arriving in mandi daily has dropped to 20 from 40.
Traders said that prices of tomatoes could rise in the coming days due to increased demand during the festive season.
