Soaring vegetable prices hit vendors’ profit margins

Maqsood Maniyar | NT

Vegetable prices in Bengaluru have shot up due to an increase in the transportation costs following the fuel price hike.

Vendors are now buying vegetables at higher prices from the distributors. This has shrunk their profit margins. Most of them felt that increasing the retail prices even slightly would affect their sales negatively, but they had no choice but to do it with some vegetables.

Panjali, a vegetable seller at KR Market said that the price of carrots had more than doubled when bought in bulk from the distributors. “I used to buy 50 kg of carrots at Rs 600-700. Now I get them at Rs1,500. I used to sell them to the customer for Rs 10 per kg. Now, I do so for Rs 20 per kg,” she said.

Khalil, who was hawking tomatoes, had similar complaints. “A few weeks ago, I bought tomatoes in bulk (50 kg) for anywhere between Rs 120 and Rs 150. Now, I have to shell around Rs 350-400 for the same quantity,” he said.

Wasiullah, a vendor who has been in the business for about three years, said that ginger prices had risen at his distributors’ in Kalasipalya. “Earlier a bag of ginger (50 kg) used to cost me Rs 1,000. In the past few weeks, I’ve been paying Rs 1,400 for the same,” he said.

Vegetable seller Imtiyaz Ahmed said the price rise could be felt in the rate of onions as well. “I used to secure a bag (50 kg) of onions for roughly Rs 500 to Rs 600. Now the same will cost me Rs 700 to Rs 800. I still sell onions for Rs 16.50 per kg because the customer doesn’t understand. They’ll still haggle for prices. They’ll say they get vegetables near their house too. They don’t understand what’s happening with the prices here. The sales have also gone down. Earlier, we moved 20 to 30 bags (50 kg of vegetables each) easily. Now, we’d be lucky if we moved 10,” he said.

Fruit seller Annamalai said that his goods had also been affected by the price rise. “Around 18 kg of grapes used to cost me Rs 850 to Rs 900. Now they cost anywhere between Rs 1,300 and Rs 1,400,” he said.

Other edibles like dry fruits, spices and dal have also become dearer as well. Amin and Inayatullah, who run a shop in KR Market said they had to hike the price of their goods. “The price of almonds went from Rs 560 per kg to Rs 620. Dates went from Rs 220 to Rs 290 per kg,” Amin said.

“The price of cloves went from Rs 800 to Rs 900 per kg. Dal is being bought for Rs 4,900 per 50 kg. Earlier, it was Rs 4,500. That’s an increase of Rs 400. Even packaged goods will be costlier in some time. It’ll reflect in the new stock. See this one kg bottle of GRB ghee. It used to cost Rs 670 and now it has risen to Rs 706,” Inayatullah said.