Prices of some essentials, widely consumed during the holy month of Ramadan, have already witnessed a surge despite their ample supply, raising woes of consumers.
Market observers, however, said the government's monitoring should be stricter and deterrent punishment should be ensured to prevent artificial price hike.
Ramadan will begin from the last week of next month but prices of essentials have started increasing both at wholesale and retail markets.
Chickpea (gram) increased by 6 per cent (pc), grass pea (khesari) by 8 pc, local garlic by 29 pc, onion by 12 pc, muri by 8-10 pc and palm oil by 5.5 pc in last two weeks, according to the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) and the Department of Agricultural Marketing (DAM).
The prices of date and sugar were static so far.
However, prices of rice, beef, mutton and soybean oil are now 11-25 pc, 23 pc, 27 pc and 11-14 pc higher respectively compared to those six months back, TCB said.
Ranajit Majumder, a Khatunganj-based trader told the FE that finest quality chickpea prices increased to Tk 2,950-Tk 2,975 a maund (37.32 kg in the area) which was Tk 2,650-Tk 2,700 ten days back.
He said medium quality essential is now selling at Tk 2,700-Tk 2,750 from Tk 2,500-2,550 a maund earlier.
The price might rise further, he said.
Palm oil prices also rose to Tk 2,700 a maund from Tk 2,600 a week back, he said.  
Quality chickpea, however, was selling at Tk 95-Tk 100 and medium quality at Tk 84 to Tk 90 a kg at retail markets in Dhaka city in the last seven days.
The prices increased by Tk 4-Tk 5 at retail in a week and are set to increase further as their wholesale prices have been rising, said Mubarak Ali, a grocer at Bonolota Kitchen Market in Newmarket area.
According to the Price Monitoring and Forecasting Cell under the Ministry of Commerce (MoC), the private sector imported  0.303 million tonnes of chickpea in the last 15 months against a demand of only 0.08 million tonnes.
The importers brought more than 35,000 tonnes of date when the demand is hardly 20,000 tonnes.
The country has an availability of more than 2.7 million tonnes of onion against 2.2 million tonnes of demand. Local production was 1.9 million tonnes in the current financial year.
Md Akhter Hossain, team leader of the market monitoring cell under the MoC, said both local production and import of some key essentials are good enough to meet the demand.  
Mr Hossain, also chief officer (commercial) at TCB said the Corporation has targeted to begin its open market sale from Shab-e-Barat (the religious event observed two weeks before Ramadan) through 174 trucks this year.
"We have already imported 2,000 tonnes of lentil, 2,000 tonnes of  Australian chickpea and 1,000 tonnes of soybean oil", he said.
"We have completed all formalities to buy 1,000 tonnes of sugar from the state-run mills" said Mr Hossain. He said tendering process for import of  date is going on and they are expecting 100 tonnes of the product to reach consumers in time.
Market monitoring teams will be active to prevent any artificial shortage during Ramadan, he said.
Additional research director at local think-tank Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) Dr Khondaker Golam Moazzem said though the country follows open market policy, competition is almost absent as the market is dominated by a section of importers.
He said the government's monitoring should be real to keep pressure on traders to prevent irrational price hike.
The commerce ministry should publish data on local production, import and international prices on monthly basis to inform consumers about prices.
Terming the government's action insignificant he said it should take measures to import good volumes of essentials through TCB and to provide them at subsidised rates to the limited income group, he said.
Talking about the price increase, Consumers Association of Bangladesh (CAB) Secretary Humayun Kabir Bhuiyan said prices of rice, meat, fish reached their peak this year.
Lack of market monitoring might lead to further surge in prices of essentials during Ramadan, he commented.
He said stringent punishment should be given to unscrupulous traders to prevent artificial shortage.   
tonmoy.wardad@gamil.com [Read More]

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Source: The Financial Express