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Weather or middleman to blame for chillies at Rs. 1,100?
Narahenpita market: No one to buy vegetables. Pix by Athula Devapriya
Vegetable prices are soaring well ahead of the Christmas season with heavy rains affecting cultivation and harvesting, traders and farmers said this week. Vegetable prices have gone up by more than 50 per cent compared to last month: Limes and green chillies are topping the list at Rs. 1,000 a kilo.
H.M. Tissa Kumara, a labourer, said he could barely feed his five-member family with the Rs. 1,500 he earns a day.A kilo of green beans has increased from Rs. 120 to Rs. 180 while carrots have gone up Rs. 100 from Rs. 200.
A vegetable seller at the Narahenpita Market, T.S. Perera, said that he had bought carrots, green chillies and green beans tosell them but most of the vegetables had perished because of the weather.
“I sold vegetables for over eight years but haven’t previously experienced this increase in prices of vegetables coming from all parts of the country,” he said.
H.M. Tissa Kumara: Finding it hard to feed his family
He said two-thirds of the green chillies and beans he had bought from farmers had to be thrown away. “I had to raise prices to cover the losses,” he said.
People were definitely buying only half of what they used to buy because of the rising costs, another vegetable seller, Susantha Hemal, said.
He said radishes had doubled in price to Rs. 120 and that green chillies had gone from Rs. 200 in previous weeks to Rs 1,100. Prices of brinjal, ladies fingers, dambala and capsicum had also increased because of the weather.
Fruit prices remain the same, said another stallholder, P. Sunny.
He said the high demand for vegetables during the festive season normally led to a gradual price increase through December, but, due to the rainy weather, prices had gone up even before the season started.
Due to the lack of business, Mr. Sunny said on most days he had to throw away a huge amount of vegetables. He had to pay his shop assistants their daily wages despite the loss in earnings.
T.S. Perera: Vegetable seller at Narahenpita Market
The high vegetable prices have also affected restaurants and those in the food parcel business.
The owner of a small restaurant, H.R.D. Priyangika, said she was used to making 200 lunches at a cost of Rs. 10,000 but now was unable to buy half the amount of vegetables previously bought.
“I sell a lunch packet with three different vegetables for Rs. 150, yet the kilo of green chillies that I use to spice up food is about Rs.1000 while onion and potato prices are also increasing,” she said.
Ms. Priyangika said her expenses exceeded her income and she barely managed to run her business. The government should step in and stabilise the prices of vegetables in the forthcoming budget, she said.
A housewife visiting the Narahenpita markets, Sagarika Fernando, said one expected vegetable prices to be lower in the markets but they were higher than supermarket prices.
Despite most traders and farmers blaming the adverse weather for the price increases a consumer rights group claims middlemen are manipulating the market.
H.R.D. Priyangika: Owner of small restaurant
National Consumer Rights Protection Movement Chairman Ranjith Withanage said vegetable prices had increased due to blackmarket sellers and intermediaries sending products to markets at higher prices.
P. Sunny: Forced to throw away veggies due to low sales
