Maharashtra onion farmers have urged the Centre to announce a special ₹10,000 crore revival package to address their severe financial crisis. According to reports from Business Standard, Bharat Dighole, founder-president of the Maharashtra State Onion Growers Farmers Association, stated that farmers have suffered huge losses over the years due to what he termed flawed export policies, spurious seeds, storage losses and other factors. The association has demanded that assistance be transferred directly into farmers' bank accounts to offset their losses.
The Centre's decisions to impose export bans in 2019, 2020 and 2023-24, levy a 40 per cent export duty and fix minimum export prices of $850 and $550 per tonne at different periods have significantly impacted onion farmers. As reported by Business Standard, the central government's move to release buffer onion stock through NAFED and NCCF at lower rates in the domestic market adversely affected prices of the kitchen staple and caused substantial financial losses to farmers. National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd. (NAFED) and National Cooperative Consumers' Federation of India (NCCF) are central agencies tasked with procuring and maintaining buffer stocks of onions.
Onion growers have faced multiple challenges including excessive rainfall, hailstorms, unseasonal rains, floods, drought, spurious seeds and crop diseases. According to the association's statement reported by Business Standard, farmers who stored onions in 2025 and sold them in 2026 received extremely low prices. Maharashtra has approximately 10 to 15 lakh farmer families involved in onion production annually, based on cultivation area, farm-size patterns, agricultural studies and government data.
The association has called for a subsidy scheme for certified onion seeds, a 100 per cent subsidy for storage sheds and warehouses, and a special fund to facilitate direct sales from farmers, farmer-producer organisations (FPOs), cooperatives and growers' associations to consumers. As reported by Business Standard, it has sought special financial provisions for setting up onion processing industries in major bulb-producing districts including Nashik, Ahilyanagar, Pune, Beed, Satara, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalgaon, Dhule and Solapur. The body has also demanded support for farmer-owned units producing onion powder, onion flakes, dehydrated onion, onion paste and other value-added products.
The association has called for the creation of an onion export promotion fund, a stable long-term national onion export policy instead of recurring export bans and duties, and a 'National Onion Stabilisation Fund' to provide immediate financial protection to farmers when prices collapse. According to Business Standard, it has also demanded interest-free or low-interest loans to prevent distress sales of stored onions, special assistance to farmer-producer companies and cooperatives for onion procurement, storage, processing and marketing, and the establishment of an independent 'National Onion Producers Corporation' to safeguard growers' interests.
