Onion is a very common vegetable, which both the poor and rich use daily. The juicy bulb apart from being a highly needed vegetable also has medicinal value. It is used as spices for cooking curry. Onion is used as a medicine for sunstroke and diabetes. It is also used as a stimulant.
Onion is a winter crop, which favours Deccan soil and is cultivated throughout the south and western part of India. Maharashtra is very famous for its spectacular varieties.
There are two types of onion found in Odisha and also cultivated as winter crop. Bulb and red clove types. But it is not widely cultivated like entire bulb type. This variety of onion is gradually dwindling, because this type is not cultivated extensively as compared to bulb-type. The clove type onion gives less production per hectare as compared to bulb variety. But this type is best suitable to the coastal climate of Odisha. The State Agricultural department should encourage the farmers of Odisha to cultivate clove type, which is tasty and can last long. This variety also needs less irrigation and there is a wide market of the variety in the State. This variety of onion needs nitrogen and potash where organic soil is found. The crop gives yield within 3 to 4 months. Odisha is very rich in organic soil. Generally, the land of river basins having rich potentialities of organic soil and soil fertilities is quite suitable for production of onion, garlic and potato with other crops. Odisha has vast areas of more than two lakhs square kilometers of basin lands of rivers. If the land is intensively cultivated with adequate technical knowhow, Odisha will be a surplus State in production of onion.
The bulb type onion is cultivated for two purposes. The green onion plants are pulled out from the soil when bulbs are not fully developed and the plants are green. This type of onion plant is either harvested for vegetable or to eat raw and is harvested before maturity. But to get matured onions, it takes 3 to 4 months’ time to complete the fully grown onions. Generally, this type is grown from seeds. But the clove type of onion is propagated from individual cloves, which is known as vegetable propagation suitable for the geo-climatic situation of Odisha and coastal provinces.
But the bulb type of onion always prefers Deccan soil, which is generally black cotton soil. The black soils are found in parts of undivided MP, Maharashtra, Gujarat, UP, Rajasthan, AP, Tamilnadu, Mysore and parts of Odisha. The wide tracts of Deccan soils are found within the western parts of Odisha. There are certain races like Bhuliasand agrias of western Odisha, who have expertise in cultivation of onion with other types of vegetables. Mostly, these people are economically poor and they sell out the productions of onion right in the harvesting season to get economic support for their household managements. The writer served in western Odisha and knows how the tribal people are exploited by the traders of Raipur while purchasing onion. These traders purchase the products from the peasants at throw-away prices and procure the same to supply to the stockists of other States like Nashik, West Bengal and other parts of the country.
These stockist again recycle the same to Odisha. The peasants of Kalahandi, Balangir, Nuapatna and Baragarh are thoroughly exploited by the outside traders. When the local administration is not taking any effort to check distress sale of onion from our State, the traders are exploiting the common people when they sell the onion at inflated rates during the shortage period. Again lack of adequate storing facilities in western Odisha also forces the growers to go for distress sale. Onion being a highly perishable vegetable, it needs storage facility to be kept stored for the off season. But our State is not having sufficient storage as a result of which a huge quantity of onion goes waste. The indigenous storage system cannot store the vegetable for a longer period. A temperature ranging from 20 to 30 degree centigrade is always preferable for onion. The climate of western Odisha is so good for cultivation of onion, garlic and potato that cultivation of the crop at a large scale can easily meet the onion crisis during the off season. The State Government should take adequate steps to encourage onion cultivators of the State with declaration of proper and reasonable support prices.
The merits of ecological management of different soils are yet to be properly appreciated by the local farmers. As a result, they are not able to properly utilize land resources of Odisha. Not only the Deccan or black cotton soil, the alluvial soil is extremely good for production of onion and potato, including other vegetables, which the State Government has not paid due attention. We have more than 2lakh square kilometers of alluvial land. The deltaic alluvium is as good as alluvial soil and similar in nature in geo- chemistry action. The riverine soil is arrested within the delta lands of rivers. This is most productive soil.
Calcareous alluvium soil is rich in calcium. The dead substances of aquatic animals enrich the soil through geo- chemistry process. Coastal alluvial sand noticed in the coastal tracts is rich in calcium carbonates due to constant enrichment through dead particles of aquatic animals of river and sea as well. These soils are very much suitable for production of all types of vegetable and onion and potato.
What is needed is proper attention of the Government to utilize the land resource and sop to the farmers to take up cultivation of the vegetables for which we are not self reliant. Water management for cultivation of potato, onion, garlic and other vegetables is also highly necessary. We have profuse resource of water for raising the winter crops but we are yet to manage the water in a scientific way.
(The writer is a former senior forest officer and an environmentalist)