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Required commodities for the holy Ramadan will reach the country before it starts, the country’s LC opening data showed.
Except for chickpeas, the number of LC openings of the four other commodities — cooking oil, sugar, onion and dates — has already increased ahead of this year’s Ramadan compared to last year.
Ramadan is scheduled to start in Bangladesh in the last week of March.
Traders say that the pressure starts to increase in the commodity market at least two weeks before the start of Ramadan.
This time, there was a fear that the import of goods would be stuck due to the ongoing dollar crisis.
Therefore, the Ministry of Commerce gave the necessary instructions to Bangladesh Bank earlier.
During a press conference, Bangladesh Bank Spokesperson and Executive Director Mezbaul Haque said: “We have been seeing news articles claiming that the LC opening for essential commodities of Ramadan is stuck due to the dollar crisis. But I am assuring you that there is no such problem with LC opening of Ramadan commodities. Even the quantities of commodities LC opening are rising this year compared to last year.”
“In other words, the number of LC required for the commodities that we emphasized importing before Ramadan has increased significantly compared to last year. We still have a few more days before the Ramadan market starts. More LCs will hopefully open during this time,” he also added.
Regarding the increase in the prices of the daily Ramadan commodities in the market for the last few days, he said: “As there is no problem in the supply and supply chain now, there is no reason to worry about the essential products of Ramadan. However, it is not in Bangladesh Bank’s hands to ensure this. The matter is divided into other departments including the Ministry of Commerce.”
According to Bangladesh Bank’s latest data analysis released on Thursday, the quantity of LC opened in Sugar was 511,492.84 metric tons till January 22. To this date, LC opening in sugar is 565,941.24 metric tons.
In cooking oil, the value is 390,853.11 metric tons, which was 352,959.99 metric tons in January last year.
In the same month last year, onion import LC was 36,225.85 metric tons. This time, it increased to 42,562.81 metric tons. For dates, it went from 16,498.24 metric tons to 29,481.63 metric tons.
However, in January last year, LC for 265,596.47 metric tons of chickpeas was opened. But during the same period of this year, the opening of LC decreased to 224,566.81 metric tons.
Data analysis revealed that LC openings for all five products were 1,182,773.40 metric tons last year. But in January this year, it increased to 1,253,405.60 metric tons.
Earlier on December 11, Bangladesh asked banks to relax the LC margin rate of these essential items.
In a circular, Bangladesh Bank said that the instruction is aimed at keeping the prices of the food items within reach of consumers during the upcoming month of Ramadan.
The items were cooking oil, sugar, chickpeas, pulses, beans, onions, dates and spices.
(DT)
