Commodity market on fire

On top of the unending edible oil supply and price crises, consumers are now suffering more after being burdened with the hiked prices of several daily commodities.

After visiting various kitchen and retail markets around Dhaka city, this correspondent found that the prices of many daily commodities have gone up by at least 10-25 per cent over the past two weeks.

Among them, lentils, onion, eggs and milk were the chief ones that saw the most rises in prices, while loose edible oil was still being sold at an excessive price.

Bottle edible oil — soybean and palm — are still unavailable at most of the shops in the retail markets and the traders are charging consumers Tk 10-15 more than the per litre fixed price of loose oil.

Many people were seen returning home after failing to buy cooking oil from markets around the city on Monday.

Hit by the supply crunch that started before the Eid, the government and refinery companies had fixed Tk 198, Tk 180 and Tk 172 per litre of bottled, loose and palm oil, respectively, on May 5. But the move did not bring an end to the crisis.

Egg

At the beginning of this month, a dozen of red eggs cost Tk 90 in the wholesale market. It was just a little over Tk 100 on Monday. Meanwhile, in the retail market, a dozen of eggs now costs at least Tk 120, or nearly Tk 140 in some places. The price was just a little over Tk 100 some 15 days back.

Bangladesh Poultry Khamar Rokkha Jatiya Parishad General Secretary Khandakar Mahsin said prices of eggs have gone up since the farm owners’ production costs went up due to the hike in prices of raw materials of livestock food.

“But the prices will fall soon. Already, prices are going down by Tk .10-.20 per piece,” he added.

Milk

The prices of powdered milk and liquid milk both are going up drastically.

All local bands increased their prices by Tk 10 (or 14 per cent) per litre of milk. Already, per litre packet of Aarong and Pran milk is being sold at Tk 85 and Tk 80 in the retail markets, respectively.

The prices of other brands’ milk will also rise, traders and market experts said.

Red lentil

Prices of different varieties of red lentils, or ‘Moshur Dal’, have gone up by Tk 10 (or 10 per cent) per kilogram.

Before Eid, per kg red lentils of large grains and small grains were available at Tk 100 and Tk 130, respectively. The current prices are at Tk 110 and Tk 140, respectively.

Shafi Mahmud, the president of Bangladesh Lentil Traders Association, said lentil prices were hiked since the prices of all daily essentials were climbing in the international market and the import costs were going up because of the high dollar rate.

Wheat flour

Meanwhile, the wheat flour market started becoming unstable on Sunday, displaying a Tk 6 hike per kilogram of loose flours. Packaged flour is also set to follow the same path in a day or two.

Onion

Although the country has enough onion reserves, the price of onion showed Tk 10 (or 25 per cent) hike per kg in the past 15 days.

Two weeks ago, a kg of onion was sold at Tk 30-35 in Dhaka’s retail markets. It’s now at Tk 40-45.

Besides, in the wholesale markets, onion was sold at Tk 28-30 per kg and now it’s at Tk 35-38.

However, traders have hinted that the onion prices will start going down soon.