Farmers in Bambang, Nueva Vizcaya have discarded over 2,000 kilos of tomatoes they could not sell due to plummeting prices.

They left the tomatoes by the road.

With farmgate prices dropping to just P5 per kilo, farmers said they were incurring heavy losses, unable to cover transportation and labor costs.

In Bayombong, wholesale prices were slightly higher at P8 per kilo, but still too low for farmers to profit from.

Some farmers have chosen to stop harvesting their crops to avoid further losses.

The latest price monitoring shows tomatoes selling for P20 to P25 per kilo in markets.

Earlier in Libona, Bukidnon, a farmer gave away nearly a ton of his harvest of bell pepper and squash by leaving them by the road for people to take.

Harvest has been abundant and buying price is low but the buyer reportedly refused to purchase all of the vegetables because the latter’s warehouse could not store everything, and there is no scheduled sea trip to transport them to Manila, at least, as of March 19.