Bhubaneswar: Even as the holy month of Kartik has just begun, the vegetable prices have skyrocketed with tomato becoming out of reach for commonman.
In the retail market of the capital city, tomato is selling at all-time high of Rs 80 per kg. The cost of the red vegetable, which used to be Rs 30 a kg a fortnight back, started climbing and reached Rs 50-60 a week back.
According to sources, tomato crop was damaged due to prolonged monsoon rain in the country leading to short supply to the local market. The city imports the vegetable from Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka.
“At present, around 5 trucks of tomato are coming to the city everyday against earlier supply of 10-15 trucks. Short supply against the high demand has led to rise in its prices,” TNIE quoted Santosh Sahu, a vegetable wholesaler as saying.
While the tomato supply from other states has come down, the market is further affected as the crop has not been harvested in Odisha. It will not be before two months that local produce will start coming to the city market, said the sources.
Till then, tomato will remain a scarce item in the vegetable bags of the commonman.
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