Five ministers sit to tame price hike

As the country reels from a price hike in daily essentials, five ministers on Sunday sat in a meeting to plan how to tackle the crisis before Ramadan.

Sources familiar with the meeting said the ministers decided to launch an integrated market management and monitoring approach to check market manipulation and curb rising commodity prices ahead of the Islamic holy month.

Also, the government will take measures to identify the manipulators who are controlling the prices of rice, flour, oil, sugar, potatoes, onions, beef, eggs, and poultry products, the sources added. 

Enforcing stricter legal action in some cases to control the prices of goods was also given a go-ahead in the inter-ministerial meeting at the Ministry of Finance.

Finance Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali chaired the meeting attended by Food Minister Sadhan Chandra Majumdar, Agriculture Minister Abdus Shahid, Fisheries and Livestock Minister Abdur Rahman and State Minister for Commerce Ahsanul Islam Titu.

Bangladesh Bank Governor Abdur Rouf Talukder, NBR Chairman Abu Hena Md Rahmatul Muneem, and other high officials were present at the meeting, which was initiated at the direction of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

The ministers said there is no shortage of commodities in local market and no complications in the Letter of Credit (LC) settlement. 

Therefore, strict action will be taken for any manipulation, they warned.

The meeting was necessary to determine the strategy to increase the supply of daily commodities in the country‍‍`s open market, to prevent the manipulation of hoarders and syndicates, and to quickly find ways to control commodity prices by importing essential commodities.

In the meeting, it was decided to analyze the demand along with the production and import situation of various products, identify the shortage, and ease the procedure for the import of goods to meet the shortage before Ramadan.

At the end of the meeting, the finance minister said integrated market management will be launched soon. Strict monitoring will continue alongside this, he added.

All agencies concerned of the country will work to prevent any chaos in the market, he said, adding that there is no shortage of any kind of product in the country.

After forming the new cabinet, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, too, has been vocal against the price hike of essential commodities.
State Minister for Commerce Titu on January 16 said that the government will take strict actions against price hikes for essentials during Ramadan.

Fisheries and Livestock Minister Md Abdur Rahman on January 17 said the government is taking pragmatic plans to sell fish, meat, milk and egg at fair prices during Ramadan.

Bangladesh Bank (BB) has instructed banks to relax the opening margin rate for the settlement of Letter of Credit (LC) against eight food items at the minimum level based on banker-customer relations.