Inter-ministerial meet on import, supply of essentials Nov 25
Saturday, 22 November 2008
Naim-Ul-Karim
The commerce ministry has convened an inter-ministerial meeting scheduled for November 25 to assess the import, supply situation and retail prices of essential commodities, the value of which slumped globally but were not reflected locally, officials said on Friday.
"We will discuss the import and supply situation of essentials and also review their prices in the retail markets," a senior commerce ministry official said.
He said a section of unscrupulous traders, taking advantage of the caretaker administration's preoccupation with holding the national elections, seemed to be active again to make commodity market volatile at the fag end of the year.
"We can't remain silent. We need to do what should be done to keep the market stable and bring down prices of those items whose global prices have already dropped to a large extent," the official added.
He said commodity prices have begun to plummet sharply in the past few months, at a time when the turmoil in global financial markets intensified, and recession-like situations took hold of economies of many developed countries.
Data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) show that for many food commodities, export prices peaked around June and have been declining since, with the price fall intensifying in the past two months, the official said.
He said the prices of many minerals and metals have also fallen significantly in recent weeks.
He said prices of most food commodities are still higher than a year ago in the country's retail markets, with some exceptions.
He said the FAO Food Price Index (FFPI) dropped another 6 per cent in September, falling to a nine-month low of 188 points. The sharp decline in the index reflected the rapid decrease in international prices of all major food and feed commodities.
The fall in food prices overall was reflected in the decline in indices for cereals, oils and fats, meat and sugar. After reaching a high of 278 points in June 2008, the FAO Cereal Price Index fell to 228 points in September and continued to slide into the first week of November.
"We don't see any proper reflection of the declining prices in our local commodity market although a few months have gone by," the commerce ministry official said.
Rather, he said, prices of some commodities are still increasing in the local market citing supply shortage due to sluggish import business in October.
The country's import slumped at $1.341 billion in October, lowest in recent months, as the private importers remained inactive due to fall in the prices of commodities globally.
Normalcy has already returned in opening of letters of credit (LCs), as the government took prompt move in this connection, the commerce official said.
According to statistics of the Bangladesh Bank (BB), local businessmen opened LCs worth US$805 million during first two weeks of November, which is 40 per cent more than that in the same period last month.
The commerce ministry has convened an inter-ministerial meeting scheduled for November 25 to assess the import, supply situation and retail prices of essential commodities, the value of which slumped globally but were not reflected locally, officials said on Friday.
"We will discuss the import and supply situation of essentials and also review their prices in the retail markets," a senior commerce ministry official said.
He said a section of unscrupulous traders, taking advantage of the caretaker administration's preoccupation with holding the national elections, seemed to be active again to make commodity market volatile at the fag end of the year.
"We can't remain silent. We need to do what should be done to keep the market stable and bring down prices of those items whose global prices have already dropped to a large extent," the official added.
He said commodity prices have begun to plummet sharply in the past few months, at a time when the turmoil in global financial markets intensified, and recession-like situations took hold of economies of many developed countries.
Data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) show that for many food commodities, export prices peaked around June and have been declining since, with the price fall intensifying in the past two months, the official said.
He said the prices of many minerals and metals have also fallen significantly in recent weeks.
He said prices of most food commodities are still higher than a year ago in the country's retail markets, with some exceptions.
He said the FAO Food Price Index (FFPI) dropped another 6 per cent in September, falling to a nine-month low of 188 points. The sharp decline in the index reflected the rapid decrease in international prices of all major food and feed commodities.
The fall in food prices overall was reflected in the decline in indices for cereals, oils and fats, meat and sugar. After reaching a high of 278 points in June 2008, the FAO Cereal Price Index fell to 228 points in September and continued to slide into the first week of November.
"We don't see any proper reflection of the declining prices in our local commodity market although a few months have gone by," the commerce ministry official said.
Rather, he said, prices of some commodities are still increasing in the local market citing supply shortage due to sluggish import business in October.
The country's import slumped at $1.341 billion in October, lowest in recent months, as the private importers remained inactive due to fall in the prices of commodities globally.
Normalcy has already returned in opening of letters of credit (LCs), as the government took prompt move in this connection, the commerce official said.
According to statistics of the Bangladesh Bank (BB), local businessmen opened LCs worth US$805 million during first two weeks of November, which is 40 per cent more than that in the same period last month.