Home ›› 21 May 2022 ›› Back
Rising prices of commodities such as oil, rice, flour and onion have caused the prices of all kinds of food served in restaurants to go up, putting a serious squeeze on the wallets of consumers.
Many people – especially those from the low-income groups – are finding it difficult to cope with rising food prices as most of them have to eat at least a meal a day at restaurants.
If anyone wants to have breakfast at an average restaurant, they now have to count Tk 10 for a parata, Tk 20-25 for an omelette and Tk 25 – Tk 30 for one serving of vegetable curry which was earlier sold at Tk 5-6, Tk 15 – Tk 20 and Tk 20 – Tk 25 respectively.
Prices of popular snacks such as Singara and Samucha have also increased by one and a half times more than before. The consumers now have to count at least Tk 50 to Tk 100 more for lunch and dinner.
However, some restaurant owners are yet to increase the price but they reduced the amount of food in servings.
Imran Hasan, secretary-general of Bangladesh Restaurant Owners’ Association (BROA), told The Business Post, “We work to protect the interests of restaurant owners. But we do not have the legal authority to say anything if the food prices go up in different establishments.”
“We will lose our customers if we increase the price of food. Many have increased the price a little to adjust the rising cost of commodities, while many have reduced the amount of food in servings without raising the price.”
He, however, said the association has requested restaurant owners to keep the price of food at a tolerable level.
Restaurateur Shamim Ahmed said, “Flour prices have been rising for the past two months, but we continued with the same price for parata. But in the past week, the price of a 50 kg sack of flour has increased by more than Tk 350 to Tk 400.
“So, I was forced to increase the price of parata. And the prices of egg omelette and vegetable curries have also gone up due to an increase in oil prices.”
Before Eid-ul-Fitr, a parata was sold for Tk 6 at Bismillah Hotel in Tejgaon industrial area of Dhaka. On Thursday, they were selling a parata at Tk 10, an egg omelette at Tk 20. Prices of singara and samucha remained the same there but they became smaller in size.
Masum, an employee of a restaurant in Rampura, said there is no way to use less oil for frying Singara and Puri. So the price of this food has been increased.
They are now using 10 to 12 kg of oil a day instead of 20 kg a day.
Counter managers at Star Kebab & Hotel in Dhanmondi said prices of their foods go up by Tk 5 every year. However, they did not increase the price of food this time. However, waiters at the restaurant said prices of all items they serve have increased by Tk 5 to Tk 10.
A private company executive Jamal Uddin said earlier it took around Tk 100 to Tk 120 for lunch earlier but now it costs a minimum of Tk 150 to Tk 200. “Customers like me ultimately face the pressure of the increased price and it is affecting us in our daily expenses,” he said.
Shoe vendor Rahmat, rickshaw-puller Alamgir and construction worker Taher at Karwan Bazar said they earlier could have lunch for Tk 50 to Tk 60 but now it went up to Tk 80 to Tk 100.
