With the increase in prices and low supply of soybean oil in the market causing immense public suffering, Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi will brief the media on the current state and management of the country’s edible oil market on Monday.
According to sources, soybean oil has not been available in the capital's markets long before Eid-ul-Fitr.
People were in dire straits as they could not get the most popular edible oil in the market on the eve of Eid.
Traders did not even respond to a call by Helal Uddin, former senior vice president of the Bangladesh Shop Owners’ Association, to release all soybean oils stored in the warehouses.
Later, the Bangladesh Vegetable Oil Refiners & Vanaspati Manufacturers Association raised the retail price of bottled soybean oil by Tk38 per litre.
Prices of edible soybean oil have increased for the second time in five months Mehedi Hasan/Dhaka TribuneVisiting the market on Sunday, this correspondent found that there was a scarcity of soybean oil in the shops. Asked, the shop owners said they were not getting enough supply from the distributors.
However, representatives of the country's edible oil refining companies and the Directorate of National Consumers' Right Protection (DNCRP) claim that there is no shortage of soybean oil supply. The crisis in the market is due to the stockpiling by the retailers.
Golam Mawla, president of Bangladesh Wholesale Edible Oil Traders’ Association, said: "How can we supply if we can't import oil? This oil crisis is going on across the world.”
AHM Safiquzzaman, the DNCRP director general, claimed that there was no shortage of soybean oil in the market.
“I have talked to the mill owners. They are supplying oil properly. Retailers do not have soybean oil in front of the store. But they do store it behind the store.”
