The daily trading of highland vegetables in the Cordillera remains stable amid the typhoons recently and the southwest monsoon that continues to affect Northern Luzon.
The Monthly Trading Volume Report of the Department of Agriculture-Cordillera Agribusiness and Marketing Assistance Division (AMAD), showed about 1,800 metric tons (MT) of assorted highland vegetables on average are being traded daily.
The report is being sourced from the inflow of traded vegetables in the major private and public trading facilities in La Trinidad, Benguet.
The latter pertains to the La Trinidad Vegetable Trading Post and the Benguet Agri-Pinoy Trading Center.
Since January, a total of 448,167 MT of assorted vegetables were brought to the trading facilities, the report showed.
The traded volume of these vegetables is valued at P11,085,172.732 based on the daily average wholesale price in the trading facilities.
Traded vegetables are mostly brought to the highly urban areas, particularly Divisoria in Manila, Balintawak in Quezon City, and other areas in Metro Manila.
Divisoria has the highest share of traded highland vegetables from Cordillera with 109,014 MT followed by Central Luzon with 79,650 MT.
Other vegetables are transported to nearby regions, specifically regions 1 and 2; Central Luzon, and Southern Luzon.
Some highland vegetables have shown gradual increases in their wholesale prices from four weeks ago.
Based on the AMAD’s report on the Price Trends of Highland Vegetables covering Aug. 7 to Sept. 7, the commodities namely cabbage, Chinese cabbage, and tomato (diamante) showed a significant increase in their wholesale prices per kilo.
For cabbage-rare ball, its Aug. 7 price was P6 to P11, then increased to P15 to P21 on Aug. 31 and increased up to P2 to P3 on Sept. 6 until it reached P17 to P30 on Sept. 7.
The prevailing wholesale price of Chinese cabbage on Sept. 7 was also significantly higher at P12 to P14 compared to the past four weeks, which was P6 to P10.
For tomato (diamante) that was traded at the Benguet Agri-Pinoy Trading Center (BAPTC) in La Trinidad, the wholesale price trend has also significantly increased from P7 to P8 to P25 to P30 as of Sept. 7.
AMAD Assistant Division Chief Jerry Damoyan said the increase in prices is a good sign, especially for the highland farmers to recover from their losses due to the low buying price in the past weeks.
The consolidated Price Trend Report was sourced from the BAPTC Facebook Page, the Nueva Viscaya Agricultural Terminal FB Page, and the DA-Cordillera AMAD Price Monitors.
The two trading facilities are among the major agricultural trading areas where agricultural products in the Cordillera, Ifugao are brought for trading daily. – Janice B. Agrifino
