Debate over the failure in producing enough wheat to feed the population by a primarily agricultural country has hardly been ended, when press reports on onion imports to overcome the existing shortages, trickled in. The shortage has caused unusual price hike of this commodity.

The federal government, although, has not yet called for onion import tenders, but local markets are found to be flooded with the Chinese onion. It is a matter of grave concern for a country which has once been remembered as a breadbasket for the region.

Onion is the largest vegetable produced and consumed, not only in Pakistan, but all around the world. It has special qualities, which add to taste and flavour in food, hence it is used in all traditional cuisine and culinary preparations. In addition, it is also relished in raw form with meals. It is consumed by all classes of people, and therefore assumes a place of essential item of our daily food intake.

This commodity is produced in at least 170 countries of the world. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, there are an estimated 7 million acres of land in the world, producing over 32 million tonnes of onions each year. Approximately 9 per cent of this global onion production is traded internationally.

It is a matter of pride that Pakistan has been in the list of leading onion producers in the world, including China, India, the US, Japan, Iran and Turkey. A comparison of onion produced by the world's major producers during the last five years is presented in Table 1.

Interestingly, Pakistan not only stands with the world's top onion producing countries but also finds itself among the countries having highest per capita consumption of this commodity. The average consumption calculates to approximately 6.5kg per person each year across the world. While the per capita consumption in Pakistan is reported to be 10kg per annum.

However, Turkey has the highest onion per capita consumption with an astounding 36.6kg each year, leaving behind Libya which has 32kg per person.

Keeping in view the consumption level and the rate at which the population is expanding, Pakistan needs to produce around 15 million tonnes, annually. In order to become and remain self-sufficient in onion, not only the area of production but the low national yield will have to be increased, substantially.

The national average yield stands somewhere around 14 tonnes per hectare only, against Korea 54, Australia 45, Japan 37 and Iran 30 tonnes per hectare. If we are able to reduce this huge yield gap one can imagine, where we would go?

Although, there has been a progressive increase in area and production in Pakistan but this increase could not serve local requirements, consistently, as is evident from recurring shortages during the past many years. In 1999-2000, the area increased to around 110,000 hectare, production to 1,648,000 tonnes and yield at 15 tonnes/ha. Since then, both the area and the yield of onion has been declining continuously, thereby, creating shortages. The trend of production during the last decade is presented in Table 2.

The share of provinces in the overall area and production of onion, based on the average data of the last decade (1993-2002) is presented in Table 3.

Despite being among the leading onion producers, consistent availability of the commodity round the year in our country has remained an issue which needs to be addressed, urgently.

Over- production at times pulls the price to rock-bottom level, while the non-availability of proper storage facilities and export guidance, discourages the farmers from going to higher production levels.

In contrast, at times the price of the commodity sky- rockets on account of extreme shortages due to production, pest attack, hoarding, and illegal export to neighbouring countries.

This shows that the concerned agencies fail to make reliable assessment regarding onion production and consumption in the country and for the export of the surplus commodity.

Keeping in view favourable agro climatic conditions for production, particularly in Sindh and Balochistan, it is required that small to medium size onion farms be set up in potential areas and all sorts of help from the concerned departments be extended to them.

It is a blessing that we have in our proximity many South East Asian and Middle Eastern countries, who are major importers of onion. There is an urgent need to adopt diverse strategies and produce newer varieties of onion to carve out a niche in the nearby international markets.

But it must only be done after our own domestic requirements are met. It must not be done like what we did with wheat in the recent past, when at one hand we exported 0.25 million tonnes of wheat and on the other imported 0.5 million tonnes to meet our requirements.

Qualitative and quantitative improvement in both production and marketing over the years has established onion cultivation as a source of earning for farmers and to domestic traders and exporters.

It has now become a cash crop which is in demand in export market throughout the year, as well as in the home market. Promising agriculturists still believe that the country can become an even big producer and exporter of onions in the region. In order to achieve this task arrangements would have to be made to ensure that onion producing areas are catapulted to the front-line by expanding its sowing area and increasing the yield.

In order to achieve this task the government must plan and implement various schemes like imparting technical guidance at each stage from sowing to production and post-harvest management, including proper storing of the surplus quantity.