Named a country where onions are so expensive that they are smuggled into the country
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From salads to stews, the humble onion is a key ingredient in nearly every Filipino dish. But now the vegetable costs almost three times as much as chicken in the Philippines.
Red and white onions sold for 600 Philippine pesos ($11) a kilo on Monday, compared to 220 pesos ($4) a kilo for chicken, according to the country’s Department of Agriculture.
Even beef brisket is 30% cheaper than onions by weight as the price per kilogram of onions has risen above the daily minimum wage.
Joey Salceda, economist-in-residence for the Philippine House of Representatives, lamented on Sunday that the country now has “the world’s most expensive domestic onion prices” while Filipinos flooded social media complaining about sky-high prices.
The rise in prices comes after a wave of super typhoons hit the Philippines last year, damaging crops by tens of billions of pesos. Inflation in the Southeast Asian nation has seen skyrocketing inflation in recent months, with consumer prices jumping 8.1% in December to a 14-year high, according to the Philippine Statistics Office.
The record prices prompted a number of official investigations, including by lawmakers and the country’s ombudsman.
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