Onion production potential, limitations and its prospects for improvement in the farming system of Punjab, Pakistan.

This paper will briefly highlight about onion production and marketing constraints seasonality status, primary trade locations, consumption, and several challenges that facing onion industry in the Punjab province. Onion is usually cultivated as a cash crop for fetching good returns. Area under onion crop has been increasing even upto 17 percent of jump from the previous year but the productivity is declining monotonically due to number of threats including pest and diseases attack, lack of improved varieties and quality seed and in conjunction of high costs of all purchased inputs, Although the local onion (desi variety) has a good return and thus the target area farmers are cultivating it as a commercial crop. Very small percentage (i.e., 14) of the onion growers have cultivated improved and hybrid varieties in the area. The main reasons appraised in yield reduction were low quality seed, insects/pests and diseases attack, water stress, marketing and costly inputs (Urea, DAP) in order of priority ranking. Similarly in order of ranking, the chief marketing constraints were observed low price of product, exploitation of intermediaries, high cost of package and packing material, transportation problems, etc. All these reasons have adverse impact on the quality and profitability of the onion due to which Pakistan has not been able to earn significant foreign exchange and exploit full export potential. There is an urgent need to adopt diverse strategies of cost effective and productivity boosting through introducing improved varieties of onion to carve out a niche in the neighboring international markets.