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| Inadequate supply, excess demand skyrockets prices of fruits | | Coconut, Papaya, Orange, Kiwi become expensive | | EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, May 17: The strained supply of fruits as well as excessive demand among the common public due to Covid-19 crisis has pushed the prices of most fruits quite high, making them out of bounds for the common masses across Jammu.
According to businessmen dealing with fruits in Narwal Mandi as well as fruit vendors most of the fruits to Jammu were imported from other states of the country. Due to the second wave of Covid-19 pandemic, the demand for fruits especially of Coconut, Papaya, Kiwi, Citrus fruits including Mosami and Orange have increased exponentially. The doctors usually recommend to all the public to increase the intake of citrus fruits along with Coconut water, Papaya and Kiwi due to which demand for these fruits have increased across the states.
“The growing demand for the fruits has led to the strained supply chain and there is no sufficient supply available to Jammu due to which the prices of maximum fruits have increased”, Sham Lal Langer an office bearer of BJP as well said, adding that as lockdown had been imposed in other states also due to which the Fruits mandis of Delhi, Punjab, Maharashtra were also closed, which has affected the circulation of supply.
Around two fold increase in prices is witnessed among various fruits. A single piece of Coconut which was priced at Rs. 40-50 has now cost around 90-100 per piece. Cost of one kilograms of grapes was 100 which has not increased to 150-180 per kilogram, the cost of one piece of Kiwi was Rs. 20-30, which has swelled to 60-70 per piece. Similar is the price of citrus fruits as Mosami was Rs. 100 per kg but now it is Rs. 160 per kilogram while per kilogram of Papaya was Rs. 40 which is now increased to Rs. 100 per kilogram.
Explaining reasons for steep hike in price of fruits, President of The Jammu Vegetables and Fruits Association Surinder Singh Kala attributes less time given to vegetable and fruit vendors to sell the products as another primary reason for increase apart from less supply of products.
“The Narwal Mandi gets open up at 4-5 AM and vendors usually make purchases and after reaching their shops, vends have to segregate the vegetables, fruits and then present the same for sale. “As the shopkeepers have made little sales, the policemen came to impose a lockdown as it is already 10 AM. The stock of vegetables and fruits purchased from Mandi is to be preserved for the next day to sell. Due to less time given to sale, the vegetable owners as well as vendors prefer to make little purchases so that they would incur little losses on account of the vegetables and fruits which decompose after 20 hours of keeping”, Kala said.
Surinder Singh Kala further said that the vegetable shopkeepers as well as vendors have reduced the sales due to which the wholesale shopkeepers at Narwal Mandi have also sought less supply of fruits and vegetables from other states due to low sales. “The fruits rates are high but vegetables prices are low due to local supply. Local production of Kiwi is not available and the supply is from foreign countries, while Coconut also decays only after two days, due to hot weather. All these factors contribute to increased prices of fruits due to which the common masses are unable to purchase the same”, Kala said and appealed to the government to increase timings of sale, which would help to reduce the prices of fruits.
Those dependent on salaries are able to purchase fruits at high prices but due to lockdown conditions, several businesses and daily wage work have already stopped. On one hand the earnings of a large population have shrunk, while those infected by Covid-19 pandemic have been facing a hard time to meet expenditures while increased price of fruits have been adding to their worries. |
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