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Established during the British period, the wholesale market in Moulvibazar is well-known for grocery items, spices, edible oil and cosmetics. “To retain traditions and dominance, businesspeople in Moulvibazar —a hub of wholesale products in old Dhaka— are now increasingly becoming interested in using digital technology to provide services to retailers,” Moulvibazar Merchant Association and Bangladesh Wholesale Hot Spice Traders Association President Md Enayetullah told The Business Post in an interview.
The Business Post: How much business is there in Moulvibazar amid the pandemic?
Md. Enayetullah: Spice traders usually do a business worth Tk 1000 crore during Eid season. In 2020 and 2021, our Eid sales came down to Tk 250 crore. The reason behind this fall in sale can be linked to the pandemic as spices are mostly used in cooking lip-smacking dishes.
Our sales plummeted with the extension of lockdowns as people now do not have enough money to prepare or eat rich food. Additionally, hotels and restaurants too have been remaining mostly closed to guests during the pandemic which is also responsible for the low demand for spices.
Our business thrives during wedding season which did not happen this time around due to the pandemic situation.
Traders imported a good amount of spices ahead of Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Azha but their products remained unsold.
TBP: How do you think traders may recover from the losses incurred?
Enayetullah: We are eagerly waiting for good days when there will be no such thing like pandemic. We will be able to make some ground if situation gets back to normal, or else we will continue incurring losses.
TBP: What measures do you suggest for a quick recovery from the dull business?
Enayetullah: First of all, we need to emphasise on mass-vaccination to bring life to normal. The overall situation was getting better after the government had started vaccinating people. But things went bad to worse in the middle and hurt our business badly when the shortage of vaccines surfaced. If we want to make a quick recovery, the government must arrange adequate number of vaccines beforehand.
TBP: Government has earmarked stimulus packages for businesspeople. How much did it ease your situation?
Enayetullah: It was a good initiative by the government. However, not all businesspeople could get the benefit from the stimulus money as there was some mismanagement in the distribution process. It became increasingly difficult for us to use the stimulus money due to conditions imposed by the Bangladesh Bank. Only the ready-made garment sector benefited from the fund and others could make little use of it.
TBP: How did you raise awareness of the Covid-19 and safety measures?
Enayetullah: We organised awareness raising programmes where we talked about maintaining social distancing and distributed masks among traders and labourers of our business hub. We have set up handwash facilities in 18 different places in the market. We also provided the labourers with food aid including rice, pulse, oil and salt amid the pandemic.
TBP: How are you adapting to the technological changes and market decentralisation?
Enayetullah: With technological advances, we are getting orders from around the country over phone and we are constantly trying to meet their demands by shipping the goods off to customers in different corners of the country. In this way our businesses are getting bigger. We hope to keep our traditions alive as well. This is why we urge retailers to visit us and purchase goods in person if possible. At the same time, we have to resort to various digital way of trading in order to capitalise on the new opportunities. To retain traditions and dominance, businesspeople in Moulvibazar, a hub of wholesale products in old town of Dhaka, are now increasingly becoming interested in using digital technology to provide services to retailers.
TBP: There is perennial traffic jams in the vicinity? What is your plan to decongest it?
Enayetullah: Recently we met the city mayor who informed us that the old Dhaka prison near the market is going to be renovated. A plan has been taken to construct a car park in the area to reduce the traffic congestion. The authorities also have a plan to build drains and widen roads in the market area.
TBP: As most of the buildings sprouted in an unplanned way, so there is high risk of fire incidents. How do you plan to minimise the risk?
Enayetullah: We have instructed traders to equip their shops with fire extinguishers and many shop owners have installed extinguishers in the meantime. Authorities have a larger plan to rebuild the market area in a planned manner which will ultimately minimise the fire risks.
TBP: How much is your association committed to curb the substandard goods being traded?
Enayetullah: Substandard and fake items can be kept out of the market by ensuring proper documentation. But currently we do not have a body which will identify false paperwork. We are ready to assist mobile courts in this regard. There should also be a laboratory facility to test a product before branding it as substandard.
What are you planning to make the market dynamic?
We must solve the traffic on the hand while on the other we must ensure that mobile courts do not harass businesspeople on lame excuses. Innocent traders must not be victimised and we must ensure that the courts are operated in an honest manner.
TBP: Wholesalers are sometimes blamed for hiking spice prices. What is your take on the allegation?
Enayetullah: There is no scope for wholesalers to hike prices rather it can only be done by the importers. Currently there are at least 50 lakh licenced-importers. The market usually follows the demand and supply rule.
Sometimes some unscrupulous traders stockpile items to artificially hike prices but the wholesalers have no hand
in it.
