Villar: Onions used to smuggle shabu

The scent of onions is a good cover for illegal drugs.

That’s according to Senate President Pro Tempore Manuel Villar, who said large shipments of onions from abroad are being used to conceal the entry of illegal drugs into the country.

"We have received reports that onions are used to camouflage drug shipments such as shabu from Hong Kong," said Villar, who is also chairman of the Senate committee on agriculture.

"Aside from wreaking havoc on the livelihood of our farmers, there are reports that imported onions are also being used in the illegal drug trade," stressed Villar.

He said he has already alerted the Bureau of Customs on the alleged modus operandi of drug smugglers.

Onions, Villar says, are the favored camouflage for drugs as canine sniff dogs trained to detect prohibited drugs are not able to smell the contraband as the scent is masked by the pungent bulbs.

The onions used to smuggle drugs, he says, are sold cheaply in the market, further adding to the country’s onion stock to the detriment of local farmers.

"Our authorities must be alerted to this kind of modus operandi which not only hurts onion farmers but threatens to destroy the lives of our youth and contributes to criminality," said Villar.

Earlier, Villar, taking the cudgels for the domestic onion industry, called for the revocation of import permits, citing that the country is self-sufficient in terms of onions.

The other day, a group of onion growers from Nueva Ecija sought the help of Villar against the unabated importation and smuggling of onions.

The onion growers estimate that onion output for this year will reach 168,000 tons, 8,000 tons more than the national requirement.

They said that since the Philippines is already self-sufficient in onions, there is no need to import the commodity. They also complained that they could not compete satisfactorily with the low priced imports.

The Department of Agriculture said they could not stop the importation of onions without violating the Philippine commitment to the World Trade Organization on trade liberalization.

Villar said that if the importation could not be stopped, then he would look at ways to lower the production cost of onions so growers could successfully compete with imported ones.

"I will look at the provision of cheap fertilizers and pesticides to lower production cost," he added.