The government will provide importers with necessary assistance to import onion from countries particularly from Myanmar to ease the soaring price of the essential commodity in the country’s kitchen market, commerce secretary Mahbub Ahmed said.
‘The ministry will facilitate onion import by businesses from any countries including India and Myanmar to help ease its price in the market. Steps have been taken to import onion through the state-owned agency Trading Corporation of Bangladesh,’ he said at a press briefing after a meeting at the ministry.
Worried by the soaring prices of onion ahead of the end of the tenure of the present government, the ministry organised the meeting to review the stock, supply and price situation of onion in the country where importers, representatives from trade bodies, different ministries and intelligence agencies attended.
Mahbub said an additional secretary of the ministry would visit Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar to facilitate onion import from Myanmar by the business people.
If importers at any stage of onion import face any hurdle such as LC opening, customs procedures and transportation, the government will remove the obstacle, he said.
The commerce ministry has also requested different intelligence agencies to find out whether businesses are hoarding onion at any level in the country, said Mahbub.
The TCB will take steps to import onion from any countries like Myanmar and China after examining feasibility of the import and its consequences, he said adding that the importers had also been advised and encouraged to import onion from Myanmar on an emergency basis.
The price of imported onion on the retail markets spiralled at Tk 80 a kilogram on Sunday from Tk 44-45 a kg before Eid-ul-Fitr.
A commerce ministry official told New Age that onion traders were selling onion at higher price giving excuse of price hike of the product in the Indian market, though the country has sufficient stock of locally-produced onion for meeting demand at least for the next two months.
Bangladesh has produced 19.14 lakh tonnes of onion this season and so far traders have imported 5 lakh tonnes of the commodity against the annual demand of around 23.50 lakh tonnes, he said citing the data of the agriculture and commerce ministries.
Traders blamed that farmers were hoarding locally-produced onion and the Indian exporters were not supplying onion against
letters of credit which had already been opened.
‘Importers opened LCs for importing onion at the price of $350 a tonne, but the Indian exporters are taking back onion from the border on the pretext of re-pricing as the onion price soared in the Indian market,’ Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry vice-president Helal Uddin said at the briefing.
Indian exporters are either selling that onion in the Indian market at higher price or forcing Bangladeshi importers to buy the item at $600-$650 a tonne, he said.
At the meeting, the FBCCI suggested that the government should import onion through the TCB even at higher price and sell it at the market at subsidized price.
Dhaka Metropolitan Agriculture Products Importers Association general secretary Khandakar Babul said that the country would be able to meet the demand for onion for at least next two months by the locally-produced onion but root-level farmers were not selling the products after they got the news of price hike of the product in India.
He claimed that businesses were not hoarding onion.
The commerce secretary said that the country had sufficient stock of onion and import situation was also quite normal. ‘So, we hope the price of the product will come down very soon because of the government measures.’
He said, ‘The price of onion in India has declined slightly today [Sunday] and is expected to drop further.’
The market monitoring committee of the commerce ministry and National Consumer Rights Protection Directorate will intensify their monitoring activities against excessive price hike and hoarding, he said.
-With New Age input
